Masks
by erikjavert24601
Summary: A prince with the face of a monster, and the unfortunate girl who must save him. In this historical fairytale, Erik is Illiya, the tormented Prince of Blensk, and Christine is Charlotte his young bride. Amid court plots and bitter betrayals, they must try to love each other. But doubt and fear lead Erik to make a fatal mistake that could cost them the kingdom, and their lives.
1. Chapter 1: Prologue

Every girl dreams of being a princess.

What is it that calls so irresistibly to girls of six or seven, who dream not of ruling and responsibilities, or of the wealth that accompanies noble titles, nor certainly of the duties and pleasure that attend upon marriage? Is it the fine dresses of velvet and lace, the necklaces of sapphires or the tiara of diamond? Do they dream of the satin caress of gloves that hug the arm past the elbow, or of the particular arch of the silk heeled shoe? Perhaps. There are undoubtedly those in the world who strive for gems and gowns the way some summit mountains: the achievement is the goal itself – and, of course, it's always a race.

But no, greed and vanity alone cannot account for the hungry madness of a million little girls for the tantalizing, blazing star of princesshood. If the secret is wealth, why not a duchess? If power, why not a queen? If marriage, why not the bourgeois daughter of some well-to-do merchant?

Love! I hear you cry. To be a princess is to win love – from your parents for your beauty, from your subjects for the purity of your gentle heart, and from him – be he prince or knight or holy emperor – from him for your matchless beauty. Yes, perhaps love is closer to the mark, but then I hardly imagine any sensible six year old would pin her hopes and dreams upon a basis so – forgive me – unreliable.

If you imagine I know the answer, and that I'm withholding from you now for the purpose of suspense the totemic key capable of unleashing the mythical self-knowledge of all the world's females, from seven to seventy, then I am afraid I must disappoint you. For although I saw and did much in my brief time, neither life nor death bestowed upon me any great answers to the weighty questions.

But if I must hazard my guess, it would be this: that cult of Princess has at its root a desire to be special. In some retiring creatures perhaps this desire is mild and transitory, fading with the usual resignation of childhood fantasies inexorably replaced by adult realities. But in many thousands the desperate craving burns for confirmation that they are different from the many other thousands, secretly worthier, secretly better. And for many, corroded dreams leave cores of bitterness that bleed poison into what might otherwise have been contented – if not truly happy – lives. For princesses – at least the ones commonly dreamed of - are the subjects of story. They are wanted and rejected, kidnapped and rescued, loved and abused. They inspire love in men and hatred in women, and the power of their good beauty can transform souls. To be a princess is not necessarily to be happy, but to be important. To be worthy enough, in short, of having a story that is more than just living and dying. Of being born merely to generate iterations of your own image. After all, is it so hard to fathom that everyone merely wants to play the lead role in their own drama?

Everyone wants their own story, and every little girl dreams of being a princess.

And I was no different.


	2. Chapter 2: Prologue II

"You are beautiful, darling, when only you let yourself be." My lady Berenice stood behind me, her reflection looking at mine in the mirror. I knew that she was right. The hairdresser was a master at his craft, and my curls, usually so harassed and unruly, had been subdued, swept up off my neck to cascade from a towering structure atop my head. My lips pursed and I fingered a curl, blonde under the white powder.

It was the gown that did it though. Even a fishwife would have looked like a queen in the enormous billowing skirts of deep green settled over a framed underskirt that fanned them out to a foot either side of my real legs and hips. They were complimented by a bodice of cloth of cold and slashed sleeves trimmed with more golden lace. The confection of a dress required a bit tighter lacing of my stays than I was used to, and I felt rigid and uncomfortable with this new inability to bend anywhere but at the waist. The bosom too was lower than I was used to, and I was conscious of the tops of my breasts forming a pillowy shelf as they peeked out from the gold lace. This was no gown for a girl; in this gown, suddenly, I was a woman.

"He will be pleased." Berenice's reflection met my eyes meaningfully in the wavy glass.

"How do you know?" I bit my lip and studied myself nervously. I felt ridiculous, like a child dressing up in her mother's clothes. I felt again what I had felt a hundred times since leaving home, the impulse to flee back to Friedental, to the gently rolling landscapes of my childhood, to bury my face in my father's shoulder and never stray from there.

"How do you know?" I repeated. "You do not know him." _And neither do I._

"I know men," said Berenice, the reflection of her black, gleaming eyes staring back into my own. "If he's a man, he will be pleased."

I was sixteen, a girl from the countryside, and tomorrow I would enter the glittering capital and wed my prince.


	3. Chapter 3: The Castle

My father had made the match for me the previous spring, as a present for my sixteenth birthday.

It had been a glorious April day, with joyous blue skies and fluffy clouds, warm and fresh in the sunlight but still tinged with winter's chill in the shadows of the trees.

I had awoken with a smile already blooming on my face. Sunshine was streaming through my bedroom windows, my gauzy white curtains stirring in the spring breeze that came in through the open casements.

I didn't even bother dressing, but wrapped myself in a light dressing gown and flew to the new French-style doors that opened onto the east terrace. I threw open the doors and breathed in the morning air, enjoying the warmth of the sun on my face and on the tops of my barefoot feet. Every year on the morning of my birthday, my father made sure my present was waiting for me on the lawn when I awoke.

Sitting on the lawn fifty feet away was a castle. It had appeared overnight as if by magic, for it certainly hadn't been there when I'd retired the night before. I bit my lip over a smile and admired my father's ingenuity and cunning.

To my eye, accustomed to the spacious, airy styles of our manor house and the new styles of palace coming from France to Vienna, and then to Salzburg, this castle was… exotic. Palaces like Schönbrunn were designed to pleasure the senses: large glass windows to let in the light, the better to seen the fine furnishings and luxurious appointments; stately approaches and wide-set symmetrical designs to lend the mind harmony; sprawling greens for strolling and riding, filled with fruit trees, fantastic menageries, picturesque gazebos and porches. Friedental, my home, was like a miniature version of such places.

I'd seen castles, of course. The countryside of Austria is scattered with them. But the castles I knew were squat, ugly things. They had been built strong and stocky to withstand the force of catapults and battering rams. The stones of their wall rough and unadorned, because elegance won't keep out a siege or a raid by the Turks. Many are now nothing more than crumbling ruins, and those that stand intact are drafty and drear, abandoned by their noble owners for more modern residences.

But this castle that had appeared in miniature on our lawn was no mouldering pile. Crenellations it had, and arrow-slit windows, but the impression was not one of mass and strength, but of height and beauty. Long, slender turret towers shot up into the air from every corner, starting from the outer wall and soaring higher toward the center of the castle. The stone was dark and smooth, worked and fitted with care to make the walls look almost seamless. The only approach to the front gate was a narrow stone bridge supported underneath by delicate pointed arches.

This was a building in miniature. The tallest tower was only about twice my own height, the battlements and staircases built for tiny people the size of my thumb. Sitting here on the groomed green lawn that doubled as our croquet court in the summer, it looked as fantastical and out-of-place as a dragon. I circled it slowly, examining it from every side. My bare feet left a track around it where they disturbed the morning dew.

When I came full circle to the front again I ran a hand along the top of the little bridge, up to the main gate, no bigger than my prayerbook, though in reality it must have been at least thirty feet tall. I drew my finger along the rounded top of the doors, feeling the ridges of the individual wooden planks with my nail. What delightful craftsmanship! There were tiny black metal rings as handles; it looked like the doors were made to be opened. I grasped a tiny metal ring, and pulled…

It was a drawer mechanism. The opening of the little door drew forward a platform, and on that platform were…

On the platform were diamonds.

It was a full parure set – tiara, pendant, earrings, collar necklace, and hair combs. All nestled in a bed of black midnight velvet, they appeared slowly from the shadows as I pulled the doors apart, their unveiling like the emergence of a second sun.

It was only the tightness in my ches that reminded me to breathe. I felt as if I were in a trance as I reached out to run a finger carefully along the ridge of the crown, under the teardrop diamonds of the earrings. My hand trembled as I took the crown from its nest of velvet. With both hands I held it up in front of my face until it was even with my eyes. I was surprised how light and insubstantial a thing it seemed, how fragile in my hands, when the wealth of a kingdom was embedded in the delicate platinum filigree.

"Sweets to the sweet. Jewels, for my jewel."

My father's voice. I hadn't heard him approach, but I wasn't startled. I turned to face him, the diadem still held out before me. My father was a tall man, so even confined to his chair as he was, I faced him eye to eye. The servant behind him was formal and blank-faced, his white-gloved hands resting on the handles of my father's wheeled chair.

My father's expression was not so composed. He was watching me with an intent seriousness, the lightness in his voice belied by the concerned question behind his greeting. I knew what he was asking without words. _What do you think? Are you pleased? Have I made you happy?_

"What does it mean?"

My heart seemed to be beating double-time, and I feared I already knew the answer. Every year on my birthday a present ahd been waiting for me on this lawn. When I was thirteen it had been a pavilion for tea-parties. At fourteen a pure-white pony. At fifteen a grown-up cabriolet that I could drive myself.

Today I was sixteen, and these jewels were not just a birthday present.

"it means," he said, his voice impossibly slow and even. "I have found a husband for you." The world seemed to narrow to a pinpoint focused on my father's serious blue eyes.

"Wh-" My voice wasn't working properly. "Who?" I managed breathlessly.

"Kazimir."

My breath came out in a great whoosh. "The Prince of Blensk."

He nodded. "Come, let us see how it looks." He reached out and I handed him the tiara. My knees were watery and I more collapsed than kneeled on the grass before him. The tears were coming unbidden to my eyes as I bent my head. He settled it atop my hair, my curls still undressed and slept-on. I blinked, but couldn't stop one fat tear from rolling down my cheek as I looked up at my father's earnest face. He tweaked my chin with his thumb, but there was no playfulness in his gaze, only tenderness.

"Princess."

I felt the smile come trembling to my lips, and then I was wrapped in his embrace, his hand stroking my hair and my face buried in his neck.

"Thank you," I whispered into his collar. "Oh Papa, thank you."


	4. Chapter 4: On the Threshold

_Author's Note: Thank you so much to my readers who are beginning this journey with me! This fic is a novel and will have novel pacing, which means that *unfortunately* Erik will take another couple of chapters to appear. But I can promise you that when he does, he simply explodes into the story in proper Erik fashion ;)So sit tight, and bear with me! :)_

From that day on, the rhythm of my once simple life changed.

My birthday was in early April, and the date for my marriage was set for September. Time flew past, accelerated. Things slipped away even as I tried to hang on to them. Suddenly my term was fixed. Now every day brought "the last" of something. The last May Day festival in our small village. The last hunt in the park and Brunlaufen. The last races at the Arenplaz in Salzburg. My last ball as hostess at Friedental. I had already passed my last Christmas season and New Year. Without even realizing it! Now all their future iterations were gone, banished, without even a chance to bid farewell.

I became anxious and developed an unfortunate habit of twisting and twining my fingers into contorted shapes – it was a nervous habit of which I was entirely unaware until it was called to my attention by Noni, my governess, or one of my tutors.

But I regretted my anxiety and tried to banish it, which of course only made it worse. Every little mundane thing I did was fraught with the effort to enjoy it while it lasted. _Savor this. Savor this. Savor this._ It ran like a chant through my head, until whatever it was had passed and of course I hadn't savored it one bit. A fact for which I would be doubly bitter and sad.

I remember the day I had my last music lesson.

I concluded a performance on the harpsichord of an aria by Haydn with a satisfied smile. I had been struggling with this one for weeks – maintaining the adequate breath control had been hampered by my staggering through the tricky accompaniment – and had finally, I knew, done it justice.

Herr Gordon knew it too. I could see it in his face as he closed the score on the music stand where he'd been following along.

"Good?" I asked.

He looked up at me from where he was packing up his things with raised eyebrows. "I'll not answer questions that don't deserve answering." His words were harsh but his tone was playful, as it ever was. Herr Gordon was from Edinburgh, what they were calling "The Athens of the North," and for all his learning he had an odd, rough humor peculiar to the strange Scots.

I couldn't help flushing with pleasure. I was only human and not above a bit of vanity, particularly where music was concerned.

"Yes," he said quietly. "I think that's a grand place for ending."

The words sounded as strange to me then as they look on the page now. Herr Gordon was a strange man, with sometimes incomprehensible humor, but that was not the typical ending to our almost daily lessons.

"Ending?" I teased him. "You mean you're not going to give me some horrid Vivaldi aria to learn by next week?"

He smirked and said, "And so you'd deserve it, too, you wicked thing." But his heart wasn't in it, and I could tell something was wrong. He avoided my eyes and made a job of arranging his sheaves of music. "I'm afraid, my lady, that this will be our last lesson together. Herr Mizlin has examined your schedule and decided that music, for the time being, is not a priority."

"Not a priority?" I echoed, not quite believing what I was hearing. Music wasn't a matter of relative priorities; it simply always was. Always had to be. Giving up music would be like giving up eating; it just didn't make sense.

Herr Gordon went on. "He thinks – and he's quite right – that it is more important for you to focus on preparing for your upcoming marriage, and your move to the Blenski court."

"But… our plans for the Blenski composers. We were going to do Troigen, and Baranov-"

"There will be time for music later. Once you have settled in in Kregów, you must promise me to find some dashing Blenskman much handsomer than I who can teach you the local music far better than I ever could."

I would have protested again, had I not heard the emotion in his words. For all his gruffness, our music lessons had meant as much to him as they had to me.

"Good luck, Princess," he said before he left. "And don't forget to breathe."

He was gone the next day.

How can I explain the war raging in my heart? I both wanted desperately to go, and desperately to stay. Both, in equal measure. I loved my home, my tiny family, the ease and contentment of my life precisely as it was. But there was no more for me here, no place to grow upwards, outwards. Papa had always let me be his lady of the house, his "little mistress," but I was determined to be more, a great lady in my own right, of my own house – a princess! Married to Iliya Kasimir III, Prince of Blensk, I was to be mistress of a _kingdom._

The future stretched before me, undeliniated and grand, and I was as frightened as I was excited.

My father put on a brave face, but I knew inside he must be feeling the reflection of my own turmoil. And when the time came to say goodbye…

No. That is too much. Perhaps another time.

My life became a whirlwind of preparations. Spanish, Latin, Greek, and Italian were dropped in favor of greater does of Blenski-Bulgar and Russian history and politics. I continued in French and Russian as before, though it hardly mattered; I was perfectly fluent in both. Indeed in my less reverent moments I enjoyed reflecting that I ha gotten lucky in my father's success at least in one way. Of all the languages that had been beaten into my brain over the course of my education, Russian was by far my favorite, and I excelled at it. The options on the table for my betrothal had ranged as far as Portugal and Norway, in addition to the small, Russian-speaking state of Blensk on the Black Sea. If Duke Paolo or Baron Olaf had concluded terms with my father instead of Prince Iliya, my new life would have been much harder, for my accents in both were atrocious.

Nothing could slow down the alien new life that was speeding toward me the way the ground rushes up to one falling from a great height.

The journey to Blensk took six weeks. Our progress was slow, hampered not just by the autumn rains, but by the small army that traveled with us as escort. I didn't delude myself that the extreme security was solely for my benefit; traveling across remote country was a perilous undertaking for the Blenski crown jewels. For those were the diamonds I had found inside the little castle on my birthday morning. A gift not from my father, but from my future husband.

Was ever woman in this humour wooed?

Was ever woman in this humour won.

We were met by an extra escort just before the Blenski border, including our own ambassador, Baron Straz, whose efforts I had no doubt to thank for my present situation.

We stayed the night at the house of a Lord Rothschild, a kindly man in his late forties who, as a minor noble with lands on the Hungarian-Blenski border, was only too eager to entertain the royal party.

I knew there was to be some sort of ceremony taking place at the border crossing, but was kept in the dark about the details until the arrival of Baron Straz.

I was resting in one of the rooms prepared for my by Lord Rothschild when footman announced the ambassador's arrival. The rooms were comfortable, if a bit old-fashioned, and I had celebrated my release from the prison that was my carriage with a nap on a chez longue in the fading afternoon sunlight. It is remarkable how exhausting it can be to do nothing but sit and watch the countryside roll by. Particularly when "sitting" really means jerking about and jolting up and down and side to side for a dozen hours at a stretch. Finally, a place to lay myself that was _still!_

I was just preparing to rouse myself to begin dressing for dinner, when a breathless footman appeared in the doorway of my outer chamber.

"His Excellency, the Baron Straz, Ambassador to Blensk, Imperial Order of the-"

His breath was coming out in heaving gasps, and he seemed to be struggling to get the words out as quickly as physically possible. In a minute I saw why. Only a few seconds behind the footman, who must have run to beat him here, Baron Straz himself shouldered past the poor servant with forceful, measured steps and strode into my inner sanctum while the footman was still stammering out his various titles. The Baron waved a hand at the man without looking at him, then graced me with a low, businesslike bow. He was not in a hurry, Baron Straz, despite all appearance to the contrary. I knew, because we had met before, that he simply didn't waste time if he could ever help it.

It occurred to be offended at his entrance into my private room uninvited and only half-announced, but I bit my tongue on the complaint. This was the man who had brokered my coming marriage, who knew everything there was to know about the Blenski court, having lived and worked there on the Empire's behalf for over twenty years. I needed him on my side; I craved his kindness, and his goodwill.

I stood with as much dignity as I could muster clad in a shift and satin robe. I smiled and dipped into a deep curtsey, motivated somewhat by my relief at the arrival of the person who could best guide me in the difficult weeks (Months? Years, even?) ahead.

"Baron Straz! How wonderful to see you again – I'm so glad you're here!"

But to my surprise, his brows drew together and his enormous moustache drooped downward in a deep frown.

"You mustn't curtsey, my lady" he said in a stern, flat voice. "It demeans you; you far outrank me, my lady," he explained. "And are about to rise even higher…" he added, an excited gleam penetrating the disapproval in his eyes.

My heart quailed a bit. I had just been trying to be friendly. I hadn't intended to offend the ambassador. Certainly not to _demean myself._

My spirits somewhat crushed, I felt myself fold my hands before me and turned my gaze to the floor.

"P-please be seated," I said. My voice sounded thin and colorless.

He did so, but only after I had sat down first.

He began with no preamble, no small chat or inquiry about the comfort of my journey.

"My lady, I am here to brief you on what to expect once you reach Krégow." I nodded as he spoke. I had studied the ancient capital city of Blensk in great detail, for it was the main seat of the Blenski court. Castle Kregów, I knew, was Prince Iliya's soaring citadel, the stunning structure that had begun this whole affair, that morning on a long-ago April.

He continued. "You will arrive on Saturday next, barring delays on the road. On Sunday you and his Majesty will pledge your troths and conclude the contractual agreement between you. A week from Sunday the sacrament will be administered before God by the Bishop of Arnov in the Cathedral of St. Stanislaus. The coronation itself well take place on Christmas."

I nodded. I was more or less aware of all this, as it had been explained to me before leaving Friedental.

"But you'll be there to – to help me, Baron? Won't you?" I had almost said "to tell me what to say and do," but stopped myself. I supposed putting it in such a way might have seemed "demeaning" to him, though it was the truth nonetheless. I knew perfectly well that I _needed_ someone to tell me where to arrive and when, and what to be wearing when I did, and what to be prepared to say and do when it was time.

It wasn't that I was ignorant of my duties, per se. But I knewI was about to enter a different world from the one I'd known. My father, the Count of Wallersee, was a man of the countryside, and hated the maelstrom and intrigue of cities. As a consequence, and because of his infirmity, we had attended the royal courts in Vienna and Innsbruck only infrequently. To my experience, the Viennese court was the height of culture, custom, and fashion. The few time we had attended had been heady and exciting, but it was always something of a relief to return to our estate at Friedental, nestled in the tranquil hills. But I knew, though I had never been there, that the French court made the Hofburg look positively provincial. And what would the Blenski court be like? I could read the Illiad in Greek, calculate an angle of refraction, plot the position of Jupiter, list the kings of England, and play Bach on five different instruments. But apparently my education had not even taught me the proper way for the daughter of a count to address a baron. Would I seem provincial to my new subjects as well? No, it must not be. I must be guided wherever possible by Straz, who knew the way of things in Blensk.

"I will… instruct you," he said. "On the appropriate responses. And on the protocol for the necessary ceremonies."

The distant sounding of a bell reminded me that I had still to dress before I could eat – and after a day rattling in the carriage and four weeks on the road, I was ravenous for a civilized meal. Sure enough, the bell was followed by the appearance of my lady-in-waiting Adele, accompanied by two maids, their arms laden with petticoats and undergarments. A gown was draped over Adele's outstretched arms.

She raised her eyebrows raised, silently questioning Straz's presence. Straz, though he saw them enter and must have heard the dinner bell, gave no sign of intending to quit my presence.

Adele, brilliant as she was, appraised herself of the situation immediately. With a whispered word to one of her girls, she had the dressing screen set out within seconds.

I rose, feeling myself blush slightly. I knew I would be hidden behind the screen and my privacy would be assured, but the idea of being naked with a man in the room – even if he couldn't see me – made me feel exposed and uncomfortable. But what Straz had to tell me was of great importance, and the hours were short. Fighting back my girlish shyness I managed to say, "Pray excuse me, Baron," before retreating behind the screen and submitting to the ministrations of my ladies.

If he was embarrassed, he seemed unfazed, merely rising when I did and waving a hand airily. "Of course."

"And what of tomorrow? The renunciation ceremony?" I prompted him, as my stays slid over my shift.

"Ah yes," he said. "Very important. During the Renunciation you will demonstrate your renunciation of your Austrian heritage for your new Blenski identity."

"I am to renounce Austria? My ties to the Emperor?"

I was so taken aback I popped my head around the side of the dressing screen.

"Well naturally you will retain your title and the inheritance of your father's lands, as a term of the marriage agreement. But otherwise… the situation is delicate just now, as you must know, and it is of great importance that you appear as, eh, un-Austrian as possible."

I clutched the back of my chair to steady myself as Adele jerked backwards on my laces. "You say I must know," I said a bit breathlessly. "Yet I do not. Pray, why is the _situation_ so delicate?"

"Why, the Council of Arnoff," he said, and he seemed taken aback at my ignorance. "That his Imperial Majesty concluded with Russia last autumn." He waited to see if I would pick up his thread. The silence was broken only by the faint creaking of my panniers as they were strapped about my waist. He continued. "The agreement cuts Blensk out entirely from trade along the Zheka River. Blensk is, needless to say, er, not best pleased with Austria at the moment."

I stayed silent while I pondered this new piece of information. I had been coached extensively on the history and politics between my old home and my new, but none of my tutors had mentioned this. None of my _Austrian_ tutors.

"And when precisely was the Council of Arnoff held?" I asked. Maybe, I thought, it was very recent, and consequently the news hadn't reached us at Friedental.

"Last winter. Sometime in February, I believe."

Not so very recent, then. I wanted – needed – to know more, and perhaps there were other things my Austrian education had excluded.

"If it would please you to ride with me tomorrow following the ceremony, I would like to hear more about the Blenski's feeling regarding the Council of Arnoff. Among other matters."

"Very good, my lady. It would be my pleasure."

Adele had finished buckling the skirt-frame and petticoats, and helped slip the gown over my head. The gown was an old one, yellow silk embroidered all over with small blue birds. It was a summer confection, truly, ill-suited to September weather and certainly not one of my finest. But I knew tonight would be one of my last nights of relative privacy. Beginning tomorrow and perhaps for the rest of my life, I would be on display to my new subjects, the bright star of my new court. Who, it appeared, were not inclined to like me all that much, even before they'd met me. The importance of making a favorable impression was even greater than I had known.

So I would wear the shabby old yellow dress tonight, one of my favorites from a time before I had been contracted, before I had begun thinking of myself as a piece of diplomacy before I was a person. A woman before a girl.

"The ceremony of renunciation will be brief. You will be met by the welcome party at the boarder. I believe a list of those escorting you has already been provided?"

"It has." I had spent days in the carriage memorizing it.

"Excellent. All that will be required is this: you will disrobe on the Hungarian side of the border line. Then I will lead you in a brief series of responses which you need not memorize. Afterwards you will step across the line, leaving all your worldly possessions behind on Hungarian soil, and your new femme d'honneur will assist you to dress again and we will proceed on our way to Kregów."

I knew I must have heard incorrectly.

"Disrobe?" I almost laughed as the woman tied the fastenings down the back of my gown. "What on earth could you mean, Baron?"

I felt, for I could not see, his frown.

"Precisely what I said, my lady. Surely you see the symbolism," he continued. "By removing all your Austrian trappings, your Viennese silks and Bavarian lace, you bring only yourself to this new marriage. This new alliance."

As he spoke I emerged from behind the screen, finally fully clothed. He looked me up and down without embarrassment and only then seemed to sense my distress. Undoubtedly he saw it in my face, which I knew was likely paler than my powder.

"Do not upset yourself, my lady," he said dismissively. "The ceremony will be brief. No one has come to ogle you, or any such baseness. It is merely a formality. Whatever is best for Austria cannot be wrong, surely? Whatever is best for Austria must needs be done, no?"

"Of course," I heard myself echo. "It must be done."

There is such an extraordinary difference between hearing a thing described or explained, and actually experiencing it.

I could say that the day of the renunciation ceremony was one of the worst of my life… But there have been so many dark days since then that it may no longer be true.

The morning dawned cold and overcast, and I awoke exhausted. I'd gotten little sleep the night before. Too anxious, too busy lying awake in the darkness of Lord Rothschild's best bedchamber. My mind ran in circles like a horse on a training lead.

How could I have missed this? I had spent so many moths preparing so diligently, so earnestly – my ability to be surprised by such seemingly basic facts frightened me. How had no one told me Austria was encroaching upon Blensk's trading routes? Surely someone should have mentioned I'd be required to take off my clothes and stand naked before a crowd of strangers while reciting an oath that sounded, at least to me, a bit like treason?

Of course I had been aware from the minute that my engagement was finalized, dozens of fingers had been set to work sewing a brand new wardrobe, one fit for a princess rather than the daughter of a count. For a wife, rather than a girl.

The new gowns were being sewn in Blensk – my measurements had been sent over long ago – with the assumption that the Master of the Wardrobe at the Blenski court would better know the styles and modes befitting a Blenki Princess than would our own Master Brochfeld.

I had never imagined it was because I wouldn't be _allowed_ to bring my own gowns with me across the border.

And then of course there was the matter of taking my clothes off before strangers.

I suppose no modest person must think themselves unduly modest… But truly, I was no prude. I knew, at least in theory, what went on between men and women, and I thought myself no fool (the more fool me!). I knew the act of love would be required of me with my husband on my wedding night, and likely many nights afterward until, God willing, we produced a surplus of healthy boys and girls, heirs to the realm. It was a marriage, after all. I knew I would need to be naked before my husband, and he before me, and I did not fear it. Or at least, no more than seemed normal.

But this was something different entirely. Since I was a small child I had never been completely undressed before another person besides Adele and a few select of my ladies. And this was not a group of indifferent strangers, either. These were to be members of my court. Friends, subjects, allies, perhaps even rivals. The strength of my position would depend upon the respect I could command from these very people. This would be their first glimpse of me. And how was I to inspire respect standing naked and shivering in some chilly tent?

But this was not all. I _had_ memorized the list of those attending the ceremony, eminent personages and members of the Blenski aristocracy whom I would be required to recognize and greet in accordance with their ranks. I knew that lit upside-down.

There were men on that list.

It was that thought more than anything else that kept me awake and staring the whole night at Lord Rothschild painted wooden ceiling.

My eyes were dull and bleary, and though color was still indistinct in the grey light of the early morning, I knew my cheeks must be pale from sleepiness. But it was not the appearance of my face, for once, that concerned me. It suddenly seemed that the cheeks on either side of my face were probably not those which would be hardest scrutinized this afternoon.

The trouble was, I'd never spent any time at all worrying how I looked underneath all the layers: the capes, the gowns, the stays, hoops, petticoats, shifts, bloomers, and stockings. It was silly, something I need never worry over. After all, who was there to see?

Now I was quite sure I hadn't spent nearly enough time worrying about all those other parts of me that never saw the light of day.

It worried me most that I had only the vaguest idea what I looked like myself – I hardly spent hours before the mirror ogling myself – and I certainly had no idea whatsoever what _other_ women looked like without their clothes. What if somehting about me was terribly wrong, or ugly, or offensive, and I hadn't even the sense to be ashamed of it? Were everyone's buttocks so round and squishy? Was it normal to have quite so much hair between one's legs? Or on one's legs? Or perhaps I didn't have enough…? Were my breasts an attractive shape, or even a normal one? Did everyone's stomach bow out slightly toward the bottom, or was mine perhaps abnormally distended?

I suppose the only acquaintance I had with what a woman's body was supposed to look like came through art, the paintings and statues of Venus and Daphne and Galatea and Europa that adorned the chambers of our house. If I were to take these ladies as models for the woman's form, then if anything I was too thin.

The thought of eyes, men's eyes, and other women's, on my hips, my breasts, my thighs, my pudenda, was almost too much to bear. So alien it didn't seem possible.

Yet Baron Straz was the last one to jest about something like this. And the morning had come, whether I had slept or no.

The border was still severl hours away by coach, and we left early to arrive by the appointed time.

As my Grand Mistress, Adele rode in my carriage. Any other time we might have chattered away like two birds, full of excitement and anticipation. But there was no chatter in either of us this morning. My heart was leaden, and she seemed subdued. Today was likely the last time we would see each other.

The border between Austrian-controlled lands and the Principality of Blensk happens to fall in a deep, wooded valley between two ridges of bright green mountains. To be perfectly precise, and that seemed what everyone desired above all, the border was formed by a tiny brook, grandly misnamed Der Grossalpenblaft. The pavilion erected for the renunciation ceremony had there fore been placed directly on top of the tiny river. I could see it flowing under a gap cut in the bottom of the tent, and out the other side.

The sun, which had been shining brightly when we had left Rothschild's, had disappeared in a grey haze, and as I emerged from the carriage and gazed about me, I saw fog beginning to roll down the clefts between the mountains. I shivered slightly as I watched the white, obscuring mass move slowly and inexorably down the valley toward our party. Perhaps it was the mountain chill. But perhaps not. I clung to that hypnotizing image of the fog. As long as I watched it, I wasn't doing… other things.

But it couldn't last forever. Reluctantly I turned to face Baron Straz, who was striding over to me after having consulted with someone on the Blensk side of things. His bow, as ever, was sincere but businesslike.

"All is readiness," he said, his serious brow in constant furrows. He offered me his arm, which I took. "We are waited for."

Indeed we were. Across the stream I saw a collection of dozens of carriages, surrounded by extraneous servants and postillions, tending the horses and lounging about. I knew that they, the peopleand the conveyances, must belong to those many people whose names I had memorized off that list. The collection of such human objects looked strange here. These small moving boxes in red and blue and gold dwarfed by the lonesome majesty of the green-brown mountains. A family of ibex moved along a ridge high above, looking down on us. I wondered what they thought it was all about.

"My lady?"

"Hm?" Straz's voice startled me from my thoughts. I was about to greet my subjects for the first time and renounce my former allegiance to my emperor and my homeland. I must be truly desperate for distraction if I could be diverted by meditations on mountain goats.

For once I was grateful for Straz's compulsive attention to detail. Everything was exactly as he said it would be and so I was prepared for it, at least in theory.

The tent was full of people, all looking towards me. I held my head high in an attitude that would have pleased my childhood deportment teacher, and pasted o my face an expression that I hoped conveyed neutral regality.

The inside of the enormous tent was divided into two exact halves by the stream running through the middle. Our side was sparely populated: just Straz, the chief Austrian dignitaries, and the ladies of my wardrobe who had followed me inside.

The other side, however, was packed with people. All watching, all silent. All judging – I knew they must be. My people. It was a gaudy assemblage, a riot of color in different textures and fabrics. The Blenskis were not somber dressers, I saw. I wanted to stop and stare back at them, take them al lin. Decide something about them, as they must be deciding things about me. I had just enough time to notice that several of the people opposite me were wearing masks, and to think how odd that was, it not being the season for Carneval, nor were we anywhere near Venice, when my attention was called away by Straz and the Blenski ministers.

Of course the first thing I was required to do in this room full of strangers was to strip down.

I faced Baron Straz, who was conducting the ceremony. I stared straight ahead, my eyes fixing blindly on the star-shaped League of Austria that hung upon his left breast. I felt like the deer who freezes when they sense a predator, keeping stock still lest a movement betray their presence and bring death. I stared and stared at that military star on Straz's coat, trying to forget that somewhere else, I was being peeled like an onion.

A woman's wardrobe is a story in layers, and mine were being steadily and silently removed. Cape, bodice, skirt, petticoats, panniers, stays, stockings, shift. Adele was undressing me, I knew, though I couldn't see her. I imagined her lips pressed tight and her cheeks burning as if she were feeling all my shame for me. I could feel her hands shaking. It made me want to tremble as well. I stood till ad pliant as they did it, neither helping nor hindering.

Finally when they untied a drawstring and my shift fell down to puddle around my feet, I was completely nude.

It was even harder than I had thought it would be, that finaly moment of unveiling. Harder to master that moment of panic as the last layer fell away and a rush of cold air met skin that shouldn't, _mustn't_ be exposed like this. Harder to stifle the instinct to snatch at the fabric as it fell. My hand twitched. I hoped no one understood what that meant. I feared they all did. It was so strange, so wrong, standing in a room full of such elaborately dressed people, people who were so very _clothed_ , while I was so very _not_.

There was no sound then. No exclamations or whispered conferences about my appearance. For that at least I was grateful. If they were going to talk about me – and I had no doubt that they would – they were going to do it afterward, where I could neither hear nor have to guess at the tenor of their reactions.

I stood erect, but my shoulders felt hunched, fragile in their unaccustomed bareness. I tensed a bit as I felt an impulse to shiver run through me. I remembered learning the story of the doomed English king, Charles I, who had worn two shirts to his execution lest the cold weather make him shiver. Let no one say I trembled. I kept my arms tight by my sides, using all my willpower to keep my tension from finding outlet by balling up my fists. I had decided ahead of time that I would not try to hide or cover myself. My arms stayed by my sides, my hands limp and relaxed.

Straz reached out and was handed a scrolled piece of paper; it was time for the responses. I kept my eyes fixed on the decoration on his breast; it seemed too difficult to meet his eyes. I hoped he would understand.

I stayed in that attitude throughout most of the recitation. My eyes focused on the star, my brain accurately parroting the words. I didn't, couldn't even hink about their meaning. They became reduced to a collection of sounds and syllables that, if only I could reproduce them accurately, would bring this present ordeal closer to completion.

When the actual words of the Renunciation were spoken, it was time for the next action, and in this I was entirely alone. I knew what I was supposed to do: I was supposed to walk across the pavilion, across a little bridge that had been built across the stream. Then, having officially crossed the border, I would be re-dressed by the new head of my chamber. That was all that was required of me: ten or so short steps, and then submitting to someone else's ministrations for the rest of the ceremony.

For a long, agonized, awkward moment, I truly feared I had lost the ability to move. I was frozen, stiff. Paralyzed it would seem. Moving would make everything real – the room, the people, my body. As long as I stayed still, very still, I could imagine they didn't' see me. At least this side of the line was still Austria. Over here I knew precisely who I was; over here we were still an "us." Over there was foreign and cold and unknown and _different_. No us, just them. I thought I'd be excited to take this step, this leap that made the borders of my world so much wider. New places! New people! New things! But all I felt was petrified.

To this day I could not tell you exactly how I managed it. How I broke my frozen stance and took one step, then another, then eight more, until I had crossed the tiny wooden bridge – just a couple feet wide – and stood, for the first time in my life, on Blenski soil. If I'd expected some difference, some dramatic change of temperature or light, I was wrong. Being on this side of the river felt just the same as being on that side of the river. Except in my head.

I felt the tension in the room break somewhat as my room stepped off the bridge and settled on Blenski grass, as if everyone had been holding their collective breath, waiting to see if what was supposed to happen really would. It had, and everyone – except me – felt a bit freer for it.

The intense, strained focus which had attended my undressing did not attend my dressing. There were whispers and rustling and a general shifting about, and at last I felt as if I might not be the sole focus of each person's complete attention. The relief was enormous.

But it did not last. Four women approached me in a v-formation, like a flock of very intimidating geese. As if in a choreographed dance, the four of them glided forward and dropped deep curtsies in perfect unison. The woman heading the flock, evidently in charge, was tall and bordering on elderly. She had a spinsterish look about her, with puckered, pressed lips, and a face that had not nearly enough flesh.

"Pani Spilczevskaya," I said, taking a wild leap of faith that this was the head of my chamber and that hers had been the name on the list I had memorized. I said a small prayer of thanks that her name flowed smoothly off my lips without a stumble. Even if the self standing here today was dazed and confused, she at least remembered something of the past elf that had spent hours practicing the pronunciation of each name, and years mastering the Russian language and Blenski accent.

"At your service, highness," she replied, in a voice that, even though she addressed me by my proper higher rank, nevertheless conveyed a perfect sense of detached condescension.

I forced myelf to stand there, naked, while she calmly and slowly introduced her three subordinates.

"Pani Maria Verhevsky of Piln," a rosy-cheeked blonde whose dour expression did not match her complexion.

"Pani Zosia Varen, dowager," another blonde, but so stern and vulture-lke I imagined she had spent much of her life imitating Spilczevskaya.

"And Signora Berenice di Fialmi, of Venice." This was a surprise, a bright-eyed, dark-haired beauty among all these matronly types. Sloe-eyed and dark-skinned, Signora di Fialmi seemed as out of place as a nightingale among crows. And to my complete surprised, she winked at me when I nodded to her. If I hadn't been standing stark naked and fighting the urge to shiver violently from the cold, I could have hugged her. As it was, I could barely manage a smile.

I thought about my sweet Adele standing behind me, where I dared not turn my head to look, watching these foreign women take her place. She'd been my maid since I was eight years old. Would I ever have a friend like her again? Soeone I could spend time with and feel at ease, someone with whom I could be delightfully foolish without a care? Maybe only girls did those things. The women before me looked as if they'd never giggled in their lives. The lines on their faces were not from laughter. My heart held out a tiny flame of hope for Signora di Fialmi.

The three under-women were carrying in their arms bundles of fabric that looked deliciously like a shift and several petticoats. I had an immediate urge to snatch the nearest garment I could reach and begin clothing myself.

"Please proceed," I said instead, in a voice that was almost convincing as cold boredom.

I could feel the tension melt from my shoulders as the sheer linen shift was lowered over my head and upstretched arms. The ordeal was far from over, I knew. Indeed, one might say it was just beginning and would probably last the rest of my life. But at least this particular trial had ended. I could face anything, I thought triumphantly, so long as I was wearing clothes.

With limp relief I submitted myself to be dressed by my new ladies and tried to think ahead to the next step. I would board a new royal carriage and would begin the week's journey to Kregów, where Prince Ilya held court the year round. I imagined these ladies would ride with me, or at least Spilczeskaya, since she was of highest rank. A pity, I imagined I would much prefer the company of Berenice di Fialmi. But I at least would have Baron Straz's company, and I didn't dare request the arrangements be changed further. I was terrified of stepping out of line, of committing some disastrous gaff.

In my musings I was almost able to escape myself, to float away from this room were dozens of people were watching me being dressed.

It wasn't until they had finished lacing my stays that I realized something was wrong.

My torso had just been squeezed and compressed into a stylish tapered cylinder, when a sudden cease in activity made me look at Pani Spilczeskaya. She was frowning.

"Twenty-five, madame," Berenice was saying. She held the piece of measuring floss circling my waist.

"Hm," grunted Spilczeskaya, her lips pressing into a thin line. "That can't be right. Here," she snatched the measure from Berenice. Her expert hands quickly snaked around my waist. I saw the line of her lips grow so thin they seemed to disappear.

"That won't do," she said shortly. "Can't you get it any tighter?"

"Not without a winch," replied Pani Maria, gazing at my waist from over Spilczeskaya's shoulder.

I wanted to giggle at her joke. What she meant was that the lacings could not be made any tighter unless the used a mechanical tool to squeeze me even smaller using brute force and leverage. I wanted to laugh, but her face was as dour and humorless as ever. Surely she couldn't be serious. People here didn't actually use machines to crank themselves smaller waists, did they?

But I knew my lacing, and I too was confident that human hands couldn't get my waist much smaller than twenty-five inches.

"She must have gained a great deal of weight sine her measuremets were sent," Pani Maria said, as if I weren't even there.

"Typical Austrians, not to tell us so we could alter her wardrobe," chimed in Pani Zosia without a glance at me.

Signora Berenice appeared at Spilczeskaya's elbow with a beautiful gold and orange gown draped over her outstretche arms. Spilczeskaya held it up before her and considered.

"Let us try, at least," she said, and with the other ladies' help she lifted the great dress over my head. I lifted my arms obediently, awash with nervousness.

Anyone in the room who had let their attention wander had been brought back by the hiccup in the proceedings. All could tell something was amiss, and I could feel the burden of everyone's attention bearing down upon my once more, like a weight pressing down on my shoulders. People were watching, listening.

Within moments it became obvious that this had been a terrible decision. The waist of the gown, as predicted, was too small by many inches, but the real problem was the shoulders, which seemed to have been made for a child. My arms wouldn't even fit into the sleeves all the way. The ladies' frustration was obvious, and a strangled cry from within the bewildering dark jungle of fabric told them to abandon the endeavor. Of course the dress, impossible to put on, was just as difficult to take off. I passed a few tense, heart-pounding moments in which I was sure the gown would rip or I would never be free, but finally with much tugging and many exclamations of dismay the gown came free and I emerged, breathless, sweaty, and utterly mortified.

Everyone was staring at me. I didn't know where to look. At the floor as if ashamed. I couldn't look out for fear of meeting someone's gaze. So I looked at Spilczeskaya. Her bloodless lips had disappeared entirely.

"I saw instantly you were somewhat larger than we had been led to believe," she said to me with a slight curl of the lip. "But the Austrian minister did not see fit to inform us that you had grown quite so fat."

Her voice rang out in the listening silence, and I felt a piece of my heart turn to stone. That last word, "fat," seemed to echo in the still, close air.

Something was amiss, though I wasn't sure what. Communication had failed, but I couldn't say where.

"I-" I began, my voice faltering as if I hadn't spoken in years. "I have not gained, I mean… I am the same size I always was." It was true, as far as I knew. I had been wearing that same yellow gown for over a year and it still fit the same.

"Of course, highness," demurred Spilczeskaya, in a voice that made it plain she didn't believe me. "I personally oversaw the assembly of your wardrob," she continued, drawing herself up. "And I can personally guarantee that we followed the measurements we received exactly."

I opened my mouth, then closed it. There was nothing to say.

"If you please, your highness," interjected Signora Berenice gently, with a cautious look at Spilczeskaya. "When they took your measurements all those months ago… was that corseted, or not?"

"C-corseted," I stammered. "Of course."

Signora Berenice gave a small "Ah," and then retreated, glancing at Spilczeskaya.

"I see," she said coldly. "I will go consult Baron Straz. He will know how to proceed."

She stepped briskly back over the line to where Straz was conferring with the Blenski officials over the documents, unaware of the snag unraveling his carefully planned proceedings.

Again, where to look? The top corner of the tent was bright white in a patch of sunlight. A bee flew against the tiny hole, its buzzing punctuaged each time she thrust herself against the fabric, trying to escape, and failing. Watching her struggle kept my head erect and my eyes dry.

Straz's foice floated into my consciousness from somewhere behind me. "We are expected at Kregów within the week and – how long did you say it would take?"

Spilczeskaya's voice. "Three weeks at the very earliest. The bridal gown alone would take that."

"A month's delay we cannot afford. The snows in the mountains would make travel of the entourage perilous, if not impossible. Not to mention the incalculable damage of starting out on such a wrong footing… No we must not risk her person." A minute or more of silence, then he continued.

"No. We will carry on with the Austrian wardrobe and the Renunciation will have to be performed again later. Send word now to begin work – priority on the wedding dress, of course. There was a clicking of heels, and the hiss of a tent flap. The bee managed to follow Straz's secretary out the door. _Good for you_ , I thought, perhaps a bit insanely.

"Most unfortunate," said Straz, summoning my attention back to him. He was stroking his moustache in what I recognized as a rare nervous gesture. In some ways, he had made his career brokering this marriage, and when kingdoms were at stake technicalities such as this one had the potential to unravel everything. Mis-dotted "I"s and uncrossed "T"s began inheritance wars.

"If you would please," he gestured at the ladies. "The yellow gown. That's right. Let's proceed."

I was too numb even to feel relief as they helped me into my old yellow gown. Too embarrassed to ask them to loosen my laces – which were fiendishly tight – as the yellow gown was a bit more forgiving. Too drained to say anything kind or clever or endearing as I, like an automaton, allowed myself to be manipulated into whatever position was necessary for the completion of my toilette.

My first introduction to Blensk, a miserable failure. I had stumbled on the threshold.

Whoof! If you made it this far you have the unending gratitude of your thrilled authoress! Thanks for reading! :)


	5. Chapter 5: One More Dawn

Author's Note: So many thanks to my readers and especially my reviewers! I'm looking for all kind of feedback on my writing, so don't hesitate to leave me a review even if it isn't "HOMIGOD YOU'RE SO AWESOME I LOVE IT!" Getting your feedback is the heart-thrilling shot of whisky that keeps me going :)

As a reward for being so awesome, I'm giving you Erik/Illiya in the next chapter! So prepare yourselves! :D

The week's journey to Kregów could hardly be called pleasant.

I rode in a magnificent red and gold carriage, which bore my initials in gleaming gold upon the door. Though I couldn't see it from within, the body of the behicle was topped by a crowned scarlet phoenix, the symbol of my house. It was a gift, they told me, from my new brother-in-law, Prince Damian. It was enormous – large enough in side to stretch fully and lie down, and upholstered in deep, plush crimson with gold-tasseled curtains.

In the event, it was the four ladies and not Baron Straz who accompanied me in the carriage. When she was informed of the Baron's intent to displace the ladies' place, Spilczeskaya acceded with all the grace of someone deeply offended, and so the more diplomatic decision was taken to reverse the decision, and try to squeeze a private conference between us somewhere into the already full schedule.

So the four ladies accompanied me in the carriage, and the rest of the attendants, emissaries, nobility, and servants accompanied us in a caravan that altogether must have stretched nearly a mile. It was all organized according to rank, of course, with my own glittering new carriage leading, all the way down to the baggage lumbering along behind the last of the carriages.

It might have been a pleasant journey, if I had been permitted to ride by myself.

Pani Spilczeskaya, as had been apparent from the first, was perhaps the greatest stickler for rules and etiquette who has ever lived. This at first was no great difficulty, for I had been coached at length on the Blenski nuances of the general continental etiquette, but it made for a boring and joyless journey indeed. Official politeness dictated that for the first week of our acquaintance we restrict our topics of conversation to the weather, our families and relations, and travel conditions. I had laughed when Signor Charel, my deportment master, had explained the rules to me, and assumed that conversation couldn't possibly be so constricted in actual practice.

Now, riding in close quarters with Madame Etiquette herself, Signor Charel appeared to have been correct, for nobody spoke of anything beyond the weather and their relatives, and once when I said something complimentary about the color of Pani Virhevsky's shawl, Spilczeskaya raised a disapproving eyebrow and seemed, if possible, to sit up even straighter. Pani Virhevsky herself blushed and did not respond even to thank me, as if I had said something quite rude and the only polite solution was to pretend not to have heard it.

With such friendly companions and such stimulating conversation, it might have been pleasant to gaze out the window at the scenery. We were passing through some truly wild country, and the landscapes were breathtaking. Passes took up between giant-cut stone mountains hemmed in rich greens and browns, so bare and windswept I could imagine no human had yet set foot there. I wondered, as I had never done before, what I must be like to summit one of those peaks – not one of the towering masses with near-vertical faces half covered in clouds, but just one of the gentler ones, too small to bear snow, and see it all laid out before me as far as the horizon. The mountains of Blensk, I realized, are more beautiful even than those of Austria, though I was unsure whether this should be a cause of guilt or satisfaction.

Nevertheless, all-powerful etiquette dictated that it would be rude to turn fro the sour, pinched face of Pani Spilczeskaya and gaze upon the majestic face of nature. I will not deny it caused me some bitterness. Would I ever pass this way again? Perhaps when I was married and all settled I could convince Prince Ilya to accompany me back along this road.

Only when all four ladies were asleep could I lean my head against the padded wall and pull aside a small corner of the curtain to let the scene roll by.

I knew nothing of him. I had received no personal correspondence from him, though I myself had sent him a letter. Had never seen a portrait of him, though mine had been sent to him, as to all the candidates my father had been treating with. But these were hardly omissions worth questioning. Certainly I was curious about him, but when a sovereign prince intends to set the crown on the head of a mere Count's daughter, one does not ask many questions.

Was my future husband even the sort who would enjoy a ride through the mountains? Part of me tended to think any sane person must love being out of doors, could not help but be moved by nature's beauty. But my rational side knew there were a great many such people, who thought poetry a bore, music only a good excuse to gossip unheard, and gambling an excellent way to spend money.

Would he think as I thought? See beauty where I did? There was no way to know or even to guess. But there would be time for knowing later. A whole lifetime, I supposed. For talking, for sharing. For friendship… For love? I confess I was hopeful, even knowing how rare it was, that our union might mean more than a stable political alliance and a healthy male heir.

And the "meaning" of our union was another sticking point for my thoughts.

I had thought before that I understood the political implications of our marriage. It seemed perfectly prudent on the surface, and I hadn't looked beyond the obvious fact that I would bring Prince Ilya an enormous dowry, as well as my father's title upon his death, in return for my elevation to Princess of Blensk. And since our countries border each other, our union seemed a natural choice for a general strengthening of ties between us.

But clearly it was not so simple. Baron Straz had said the Council of Arnoff had been struck between Austria and Russia in February of this year. If the treaty cut off Blensk from one of its major trading routes, an antipathy toward all things Austrian seemed natural, if rather unfortunate for my present position. But my marriage had been contracted in the following spring. Blensk should have been seeking allegiances anywhere but Austria. Besides which, to use cold logic, the imbalance of rank worked entirely in my favor. But Blensk should have had no reason to want to elevate middling Austrian nobility – there were plenty other wealthy young noblewomen in Europe. If anything, Austria owed Blensk a favor, and it seemed puzzling that no one had used the negotiating table to leverage a member of the Kasimir, the Blenski royal family, into an advantageous match with one of the Austrian or Russian royal houses. I brought nothing to Blensk besides a bit of money; marriage with me did not _help_ them any way that I could see.

These were precisely the questions I had wanted to put to Baron Straz, if I'd been allowed a private conversation with him. In my boredom gazing out the window, fantastical possibilities swirled in my head. Prince Ilya had seen my portrait and fallen madly in love with me. He was going to kidnap me and hold me hostage until the Emperor rescinded the treaty. He was going to use Friedental as a staging ground for invading Austria. As I said, fantastical.

I was meditating on all this, on the possibility of loving my new husband, and watching the scenery roll by, bleak and barren but beautiful, and my mood began to lift. Possibilityes always seem infinite from the brink of something vast and unknown. And since in those days I was still young in my heart, still foolish enough to be an optimist, the agony of the Renunciation ceremony and the disappointment in my ladies began to shrink. The world was wide, the years would be long, and there were hundreds of people at the Blenski court. It would get better, surely.

A movement in the corner of my eye made me lift my head. Berenice di Fialmi was watching me from across the carriage. The other three ladies were still snoring. She caught my eye. With a silent smile she removed two small books from a drawstring pouch in her lap. One was quite obviously a devotional, cased in brass and etched with a large cross on the front and back covers. The other, very oddly, lacked a cover, and looked strangely naked with the stitching of its quires so exposed. Very calmly and matter-of-factly, she detatched the pages of the religious book and replaced them with the pages of the other book, then slipped the cover-less bundle back into her reticule. Meeting my eyes with an unfathomable look, she opened the new book, looking to all effect like a sacred religious tract whatever its new contents, and began to read with an expression of bland innocence.

I began to like Berenice di Fialmi immediately. So much younger than the other three, perhaps only a few years older than I, she seemed like someone I could know. I liked her for the way her almond-shaped eyes would slide sideways to the dour matrons, then catch mine, as if sharing some secret joke the other were too old and slow to grasp. For the way laughter would dance in her sloe-dark eyes when Spilczeskaya became put-out over some breach in protocol over our journey. For the way she would link her arm through mine as we walked, coolly, as if it were natural that we should be close and warm with one another, instead of rigid and formal. For the frank, earnest way she would speak with me when the others were out of hearing: Was I nervous? What did I think of my husband-to-be, the prince? Did they at the Blenski court seem very different from what I had been used to in Salzburg?

Then would come Spilczeskaya's shrill voice entreating me only to walk on the stepping stones – as if I were some dull child who needed reminding not to muddy my silk shoes – and Berenice would roll her eyes, give my arm a conspiratorial squeeze, and fall behind to assist the Dowager, Pani Varen, who was always tottering precipitously on heeled shoes that hardly seemed suited to someone her age.

We spent evenings at castles and religious houses along the road, our accommodations varying in comfort depending upon the age of the house and the wealth of our hosts. But regardless of our reception it could never be doubted that our hosts were always overjoyed to receive us. Every night the entire entourage – there were near a hundred of us, I thought – was lavishly welcomed and feasted at the best table our hosts could furnish. Plays and entertainments usually followed dinner, devised exclusively for my benefit. I would sit for hour in a seat of honor apart and watch plays, operas, concerts, masques, and circuses performed for my entertainment. I watched, as was required and expected. I smiled when I should be pleased and inclined my head when I was especially acknowledged. I laughed when it seemed I ought to be amused. And al the time I tried to pretend I was unconscious of hundreds of eyes on me. Scrutinizing. Appraising. Judging.

I was introduced to dozens of people in that first week. As I lay awake at night attempting sleep I ran through their name and faces ant titles in my mind. I occupied myself likewise during dull hours in the carriage. I had thought I'd been well prepared for life in Blensk, but every day I saw evidence of how little I truly knew of my soon-to-be court. How could I ever know who among the people I met would prove loyal friends in the future? Or whose pride was such that an unintentional snub – a forgotten name or a misremembered title – could foster lasting enmity?

I was painfully aware that my escorting party was rather… old. That is, I doubted if any of the ladies were under forty, save Berenice. I had heard such marvels of Prince Ilya's court. It was renowned across Europe for its extravagance and gaiety. I had been taught that Kregów was a place of parties and entertainments, and even had a reputation of being somewhat scandalous and debauched. Debauchery and scandal I could certainly do without, but it seemed that only the matronly regiment of my realm had been sent to greet me, and I wondered why.

What could that mean? There must be men and women in Blensk closer to my age, surely? I knew there to be at least one…

Of all the Blenski, I'd heard a great deal in particular about the Princess Kira Nakahevna. The Nakahevna was the young wife of Prince Ilya's older brother, Prince Damian – the same Prince Damian who had given me the extravagant welcome-present in which I was currently riding. She was known for her beauty and her vivaciousness, I'd been told. I'd heard a story that she had staged a lavish entertainment for her husband Prince Damian's birthday, but had been conspicuously absent from the hall the entire evening. Finally when the final course was served, an enormous pie was placed before the prince, and from it leapt the princess dressed as a gypsy. They say she hopped into his lap saying "I give you the best gift I know – myself! Do with me what you will!" And he laughed loudly and, scooping her up in his arms, carried her right from the hall without a glance behind. It was left to my imagination to figure out what followed next.

I loved that story. Anyone who could be that brave, to defy the etiquette, or so inventive, so brazenly confident, must be quite some person. Yet I knew she was not much older than I, only lately turned twenty. Could I ever do something like that, I wondered? I couldn't imagine so, but perhaps spending time with someone like the Princess Kira could inspire me. Embolden me, sharpen my wit and free my thought. Well, I would find out soon enough, in just a matter of days. We would be sisters then. I knew I should like her. I just hoped she would like me…

I thought about that story a lot in the endless days of travelling, wondering how much of it was true. Not just the princess' extraordinary behavior, but the prince's reaction. Who knew if it had really happened that way – the story was years old and had travelled almost a thousand miles. But the image stayed with me – the scene of Prince Damian scooping her up and making off with her to bed. It seemed there must be such affection, such easy and natural desire between then that they could make a jest of it and be entirely unashamed.

Could it ever be that way, I wondered, with my own prince?

One night, in the country palace of a Countess, we were presented with a play about an old man who takes a young wife and is promptly cuckolded by her with his handsome and much more virile son. I wasn't paying great attention – the farce was stylized and I found the subject in poor taste. I was, after all, on my way to marry a man who, if not strictly "old," was certainly older than I. I was distracting myself by seeing if I could put names to all the faces in my view (apart from the actors, of course), when Berenice leaned forward and whispered in my ear behind her fan.

"If this isn't the stupidest play yet I'll dance naked on the stage."

I stifled a giggle and was grateful that a moderately clever reply occurred to me. "A vastly preferable entertainment, I'm sure."

"Hmmm." I heard her smile.

A few people glanced in our direction behind their waving fans, but generally our conversation excited little notice. Everyone talked through plays in those days, although I usually preferred to pay attention. The declamations of the players overlaid the soft hum of conversations, meaning that we would not be overheard.

"I can tell you're nervous," she said into my ear. I didn't respond immediately. It seemed obvious – wouldn't anyone be nervous? Well, perhaps not Princess Kira.

"Do I need to be?" I whispered back, pointedly glancing at the stage, where the young lovers were kissing while the old husband snoozed in his chair, his mouth hanging open grotesquely while he snored.

She snorted. "Not about that, no. His Majesty is but thirty-four."

Eighteen years. It was still a large difference, but it could have been much worse.

"And what of him? Do you know him well?"

"Not at all," she said. "I've only seen him once." She seemed to sense my surprise but she didn't explain. "I didn't see his coronation – I've only been at court two years." I knew that Prince Illiya had come to the throne only two years previously himself, after the death of the previous Prince had made it safe for he and his brother to return from exile abroad.

"And what brought you to court?" I asked. It was just about the only actual question I'd asked her since meeting her almost a week before.

"Oh I? I was betrothed to some good-for-nothing lord when I was twelve."

"Oh," I said. "I didn't realize you were married."

"I'm not. The boy was such a bore and besides he was being kept by the Countess of Zamira. With tastes like that he'd hardly be much use to me. Not to mention fun!"

I neither knew who the Countess of Zamira was nor quite how to respond to such a statement.

"And you didn't return to Venice?"

"God no," she said, laughing a bit. "Venice was nothing to the court here. Kregów is the place to be."

"Oh." This both pleased me and intimidated me. I had always heard that Venice, with its masks and carneval, the haunt of the infamous Casanova, was the most glamorous and licentious city in Europe.

"I understand why you're anxious," she continued. "It's only natural. But it's possible to do very well in Blensk, if you know how to have a good time."

I smiled nervously. 'How to have a good time' had not exactly been part of my curriculum.

"Don't worry," she said, laughing me out of growing too serious. "I'll help you. It's what I'm here for after all. And besides," she brought her fan up to hide her mouth from Spilczeskaya. "I'll at least do better by you than Lady Pincer-mouth over there."

The day before we were due to finally arrive, we overnighted in a manor house outside the city of Kregów, named, of course, for the castle.

The owner of the house – which really resembled a palace more than any "house" – was Lord Vilny, a senior member of the Prince's Small Chamber. His reception upon my arrival was unctuous and sycophantic, treatment I detested but was unfortunately growing used to. His black eyes gleamed and seemed to rake over me, taking in the details of my jewelry and wardrobe. The glittering green and gold badge that was a mark of his office blazed proudly on his breast, polished to a gleam that made it unmissable.

I would be introduced to the rest of the Small Chamber tomorrow, when I met the princes and princess. I knew there was no way to avoid politeness with people such as Lord Vilny; he was too involved in matters of state to be completely avoided. The same would be true of all those who advised my future husband in the management of the country. I could only hope that all of them weren't like Lord Vilny. I hoped too that Vilny's behavior wouldn't prove indicative of Prince Ilya's character. Was my future husband the sort of monarch – the sort of man – who enjoyed flattery and preferred the utter abasement of his courtiers and advisors? I truly hoped not.

But I would find out soon, one way or another.

The sun was setting by the time we arrived and I was shown to my rooms for the night. My ladies, as they had done all week, had gone ahead to supervise the arrangement of my belongings and the laying out of my gown for dinner – which I had selected ahead of time that morning. As I entered the room, the servatns hurriedly finished their tasks and withdrew, and my ladies bowed their heads and curtseyed, then drew back to make way. It had ben thus all week and though I had always been used to some deference in Austria as the daughter of the Count of Wallersee, I was still getting accustomed to the extreme reverence that was due a royal princess.

The rooms seemed comfortable, but I hardly noticed them. As soon as I entered my gaze was drawn to the enormous windows dominating the eastern wall.

There, framed in the open window as in a painting, was my castle.

Kregów. Just as it had appeared to me on my birthday all those months ago. It was just as it ought to have been, magnificent and magical, more so now that it loomed so distant, like a picture from an artist's imagination, or a fantastical fixture of the mountains themselves. It was resplendent in its majestic setting, projecting out into the valley as if floating unsupported, surrounded by blue, craggy mountains and, now, bathed in the golden light of the sunset.

"Oh." I felt my breath catch as the sight drew me like a magnet.

The spires and turrets of the castle – there must have been hundreds, far too many for me even to try counting them – thrust impossibly high into the air. Birds, though no larger than black specs, flew around the upper towers, which were so high and distant they were pale and indistinct, as in a far vista. A breeze sighed through the window, just touched by the mountain chill, and a sound of rushing water from someplace unseen. I stood, and gazed, and drew a long breath through my nose, feeling as though I could drink the cool air like ice-cold water. I must have stood there for a long time, for I saw the west-facing windows reflect liquid gold, then watched their lustre fade from the bottom upwards as the sun sank behind the mountains. Finally only the topmost window of the topmost tower was lit, and only when it too had faded, only then could I bear to take myself away from such a sight and turn back to my ladies and my room, which seemed all the more dim and colorless by comparison.

Whatever my distaste for Lord Vilny's manner, I must remember to thank him for providing me rooms with such a view.

Dinner at Lord Vilny's was, blessedly, a quiet affair, just the more intimate members of my household, accompanied by Vilny's family and Baron Straz. I suspected that it was the deep breath before I was plunged into court. The entourage that had accompanied me from the border had melted into their various Kregów townhouses and court apartments, preparing ensembles and hairstyles and jewelry for my official welcome tomorrow. I ate as little and retired as early as politeness would permit.

But I needed one more conference with my advocate, and requested that Baron Straz come to my chambers following dinner.

A footman announced him as my ladies were removing my jewelry and beginning to unpin my hair – mercifully I was still dressed – and I dismissed them so that we could speak freely.

We sat down opposite each other in front of the low-burning fire.

"You wished to speak to me, my lady?"

"You have only just begun to guide me, Baron. I need your help now more than ever. Tomorrow is… very important to me." As fluent as I was in Russian and as beautiful the language, it felt good to converse in German for the first time in over a week.

'You mustn't worry, my lady." Yet he spoke stiffly, like one unused to considering the emotion of things. I didn't wish to be coddled, but it appeared that "there there-ing" was not in his repertoire.

"Baron," I said with some hesitancy, not quite sure how to phrase what I wanted to ask. "I have no idea what to expect tomorrow."

"But certainly you have received my messages informing you of the details – if you would like my secretary to draw up another copy of the schedule-"

"I am not speaking of the schedule. Please, will you tell me something about… about the Kazimiri?"

"The royal family?" His moustache bulged in and out as his mouth worked with confusion. "There is Prince Illiya, of course, and you know his younger brother Prince Damian and his wife Kira Nakahevna. Now they are descended from the Bulgarian branch of the family stemming from Vladimir III-"

"I've memorized the family tree Baron. But you are wrong. I don't _know_ them at all. What are they like?"

"Like? Well you will meet them tomorrow, after all…"

I could tell he was prevaricating with me. He was a man of such straightforward concreteness. If it couldn't be included in a manifest or concluded as a treaty it probably didn't seem worth bothering about. I decided to appeal to this side of him. His only side, it seemed.

"But surely you must see the merit in being prepared before the event! After all we – you – have devoted months of planning and preparation. God forbid that it should all fall apart tomorrow because of some careless blunder of mine. I want them to like me, for heaven's sake!"

"Yes," he said. "Of course you are right." His right hand began to twirl his moustache, a gesture I had noticed that indicated he was working through some thought.

"The immediate family is small. The Princes Illiya and Damian are the only sons of an only son of an only son. Their father was a tightfisted brute of a monarch, but by God he left the treasury in good shape. But the coup broke him. Well, losing your kingdom is hardly a recipe for health in any case, even if you do keep your head. After Jurik overthrew him his health failed in the very prime of his life, an increasingly bad situation for Princess Margota, who was six months gone with child when he died. She followed him soon after, brought to childbed with the young princes, Illiya and Damian. Hardly surprising either, twins are never easy on women even in the best of health."

So young to lose their mother, I thought. We at least had one thing in common, then.

And Illiya and his brother were twins! How was it I had overlooked this fact! Not that it made any material difference - the inheritance remained the same whether Illiya was five minutes or five years older than his brother. All the same, I thought again of that story of Damian and Kira at the birthday feast. If they were twins, they were likely very alike - could it be possible to infer something of Illiya's character from Damian's behavior, I wondered?

"And what are they like? Prince Illiya and Prince Damian?"

"Like the sun and the moon," said Straz, in what was perhaps the first unguarded exclamation I had ever heard from him. Prince Damian has always been a strapping big lad. Athletic. A damn good horseman, and he knows his own worth."

He trailed off, and I could barely contain myself.

"But Ilya, Baron. What of Prince Illiya?"

"Oh yes. You must understand, Illiya has had the burden of ruling on his shoulders from the moment he was born. He was always more serious, more reserved. Loved his books as much as his younger brother didn't. Doesn't work to make himself popular, Illiya. But I'll give him this, that he works hard to get state business accomplished. You could say Damian has all the manners of a prince, and Illiya all the substance."

I was devouring the Baron's words like honey sweets – each fresh detail bursting onto my imagination like vivid strokes on a blank canvas.

"And Princess Kira, what of her? If Illiya is the eldest, why did she marry Damian? Isn't that quite irregular?"

"The Nakahevna is, I confess, as yet a mystery to me. Oh yes, she has been at court these two years and we have met many times, but I mean to say that my idea of her is as yet unformed."

"Is she as beautiful as they say she is?" I did not know why this mattered so very much. Likely for reasons that didn't bear examining too closely.

He seemed to consider. Then, very deliberately, he said "Yes. She is." Then he continued "As to their marriage, I do not know the details. It was not my affair and I was more often in Vienna. We – that is Austria – were at war with Prussia then, if you recall. I can tell you little about Kira Nakahevna except this: Tonight she is the first lady of the court, and she will not thank you for changing that fact when you arrive tomorrow. She is a force to reckon with."

My dreams that night were particularly vivid. I was at home, at Friedental, in a room that I recognized as the south gallery, though it looked nothing like the real thing in the dream. Instead of a long, spacious hall lit entirely by windows along one side, now it looked like a windowless corridor, made bright by torches in brackets along the walls. But my dream self didn't seem to mind the change, or perhaps she didn't notice it. I was looking for someone. I passed from the south gallery into my rooms, and from my rooms into the rose garden, though in life none of these spaces adjoined one another.

In the garden, my path was blocked by seagulls. Dozens of them, hundreds, though our estate was hundreds of miles from any seacoast. They shifted aside as I tried to wade through them, and a couple flapped away with shrill, annoyed cries. I waved my hands at them, then shook my skirt. I ran at them, driving them off. It was my task to get rid of them, I knew; they oughtn't to be here, in my mother's rose garden, that my father had preserved and had tended after her death. I ran and shooed and yelled, and soon the sky was filled with swirling, crying birds. I ran through the paths, chasing the last of them away, and as I rounded the corner I saw a man.

I had found him! My father, of course. Though he looked nothing like himself – this was a young, handsome man, massively tall, with dark golden hair and blue eyes in a smooth, olive-skinned face. But it was my father nonetheless. My dream self knew it, and was overjoyed.

I ran to him, and threw my arms around his middle – my head barely reached his shoulder. My dream self seemed not to question why he was standing on his own, fit and strong, and not sitting in the wheeled chair to which he had been confined almost as long as I could remember. He laughed and picked me up under the arms, and flung me back and forth while I held them out like wings. He was zooming me around as if I weighed nothing and I was flying just like the birds in the air around us, using my dress as a tail to navigate.

Then suddenly the flight was over and we were calmly walking through the birdless garden. My hand was linked around his arm and I was leaning in close to hear his words. Oddly close, I was leaning. Too close. Was I being… seductive? I couldn't remember trying to seduce a man in my entire life, yet I felt a smile slide sideways onto my parted lips. I sensed my gaze looking upwards through lowered lashes, and my thumb rub along the wrist of the man whose arm I held. My father? Yes… But also no. My mind seemed split in two about who the man next to me was. My father, or an attractive gentleman to whom I was making advances? And who was I? The little girl who flew through her daddy's arms like a seagull, or a dark, grown woman who was playing the practiced seductress?

We walked and talked for a long time, though in the dream it felt as short as a few seconds. Whoever he was and whoever I was, I felt the greatest contentment in his presence. A warm feeling of pleasure and absolute benevolence seemed to flow from my breast to his. It was, simply, the most wonderful feeling I had ever experienced.

After the seconds, or hours, we came upon a fountain I had never seen. Even my dream self seemed to know that this was not a regular fixture of Friedental.

My stranger-father and I advanced toward it. Even in the odd spaces of the dream I could feel apprehension building, could feel myself shrinking away from the cool, still fountain as we approached it. We halted at its edge, my knees coming just level with its lip. The surface was as smooth as glass. I leaned over to look inside.

And saw a stranger staring back at me. Where should have been a round, pale face framed by wispy curls of white-blonde hair was another woman entirely. A long, somewhat pointed face with deep ivory skin gazed back at me with black eyes so slanted and tapered they looked like a drawing from the orient. A mane of thick, glossy hair tumbled in loose curls and waves almost to her waist. Her eyes – my eyes – stared me down with an expression I have never seen before in another person's face. Intent. Scorching. Smiling, but frightening. Her eyes hypnotized me, and I felt in the dream as if I spent hours arrested by that half-mad gaze, falling endlessly into those terrible but alluring eyes.

It was to much. A rushing, roaring noise seemed to fill my ears the longer I stared, but I could not look away, she wouldn't let me. Finally, when my whole world was a screaming blur of deafening noise, I did the only thing I could think to do.

I closed my eyes.

Her eyes closed, but mine stayed open. Beautiful as she still was, her face no longer seemed to catch at my very soul. She looked like she could be asleep, and next to her…

My father's reflection in the pool, looking up at me. But now it was my father's face truly, creased and lined and dear, and topped with greying hair going to white. But then, a water lily floated across the reflection and I understood, as it can happen in dreams, that my father wore a mask, and I could see nothing but his eyes looking out at me from behind the false visage.

Then a cloud passed over the sun, and my father's eyes closed.

Now he was dead in the water too, next to the beautiful, dark-haired woman.

I came to myself, my body rigid and tense, my eyes roving wildly around the darkened room. Within a few seconds I recalled where I was, and realized that I was real, and the figures in my dreams the false ones.

I relaxed and tried to even my panicked breathing, calm my stricken mind. A clock ticked softly in the darkness. The snores of the chamberwoman sleeping in the next room floated through the door left ajar.

The hangings to my bed had been left open, as I preferred, and the candle that had been left lit had long since burned itself out. But the room was not dark. Bright white moonlight shone in through the window, whose curtains were also undrawn, per my request.

I slipped from under the sticky covers and grabbed the dressing gown from the back of the prie dieu. I knew what I wanted, what I needed. Something to jar me back to the here and now, out of that mad dream-world.

Of course it was the window that drew me. Just as before, I felt called to that magical picture, as if my eyes were hungry and craved that image of the distant mountain and dread castle. With a quick glance to the door, I flipped the latch and eased the casement open slightly. The breeze burst in, stronger than I had anticipated .It snatched the frame from my hands and flung them with a clatter against the walls. The cool breeze was heaven on my face. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. I loved the sweet, cold scent of the air, slightly damp, relished the slight sting as it poured into my chest. I froze, paused, listening for the snores from the other room. They continued unabated. The wind whipped the curtains aroun, and they danced white and billowing around the open window. I shivered, but it was more a thrill than the cold, for there before me again was the castle. My castle.

Castle Kregów was an exact twin of the one my father had given me. The same in every detail. I knew, because I had spent whole days studying my new home. Looking at it from every angle, running my hands over ever inch. Walking my fingertips up and down the steps, counting the towers, the windows, wondering which ones were to be mine, and what the view would show me. I even took to sketching it, imagining its aspect in different combinations of weather and light.

It had been impressive enough in the day. But now, bathed in the light of the moon, the sight possessed an ethereal beauty quite different from its majesty at sunset. Like the magic castle of a fairy story, the turret towers and crenellated battlements were limned with silver. It loomed large, even against the mountains that surrounded it, seemingly the only foothold of human habitation in this majestic, savage wilderness. All the windows I could see were dark; the whole place had an air of silence, enclosed in an enchanted slumber. A chill ran through me that had nothing to do with the mountain air, and suddenly the dream feeling returned in full force. A sense of fright, and of _wrongness_. It struck me that something sinister waited for me inside those forbidding walls.

It looked a beautiful place, but dark.

Except for a single window. Up in one of the topmost towers, a light flickered. Was someone awake, I wondered, just as I was at this midnight hour? Or had someone simply left a candle burning?

Gradually, slowly, the dream-terror leached out of me. The idea that some other soul was awake this night, that perhaps I was not alone staring out upon this awesome landscape in the country of strangers… It made the night a comfortable place as I reluctantly closed the window and climbed back into bed.

Tomorrow would bring… everything. It would not wash away every question and uncertainty. But it might let me glimpse the direction my life was about to take. I was on one side of a solid door, and on the other side lay everything else. From this point on. And, the most important question: Who _was_ my new husband?

The thought was enormous, profound, dizzying. But not altogether troubling. You see, back then I was still very much an optimist. Answers would come. Tomorrow. The thought burrowed with me under the bedclothes and pushed away the woman's eyes from my mind.

But when I closed my eyes, I saw them still.


	6. Chapter 6: Pride Goeth

Author's Note: Thank you for all the reads and all the favs and reviews! They're my biggest motivation! ^_^ Now I KNOW I promised that Erik/Illiya would appear in this chapter, but when uploaded the text it was just heinously long so I've actually chopped the chapter in half. So I PROMISE that you will find Illiya in Chapter 7!

Chapter 6

"You are beautiful, darling, when only you let yourself be." Berenice's dark eyes looked into mine from where she stood behind me.

I hoped she was right. The gown was new, one of the Blenski ones hastily altered to fit me while the party rumbled through the mountains from the Hungarian border. It was a deep forest green, of a silk whose sheen made deep, luminous shadows in the luxurious folds of material. The style was somewhat different from what we wore back home, with a high, stiff collar framing a plunging square-cut neckline, and sleeves that ran down the entire length of the arm, encasing it tightly and ending in little points just below the wrist.

A master hairdresser had been brought in from the castle, a Herr Friteller from Innsbruck, who was to be in charge of styling my hair from now on. Yes, it would indeed be someone's sole employ to look after my hair alone. I liked him right away; he was an older man, perhaps slightly younger than my father, and, astonishingly, completely bald. The time it took to compose my fashionably towering hairstyle – pins and pads of false hair, intricate braids and carefully sculpted curls, all stiffened with pomade and finally dusted with a yellow-tinged powder – necessitated rising almost with the sun. But Herr Friteller was talkative and friendly, trying to amuse me while I sat, white-faced and ill-feeling, afraid even to take a sip of chocolate in case nerves and a corset should bring it back up again.

I sat while he chatted and assistants and servants came and went. I said nothing. Perhaps I answered yes and no, and perhaps my pressed lips twitched upward occasionally in response to some attempt at humor. I do not remember. All I know is that I watched the window, where the sun was rising behind the castle, and felt increasingly like someone had put my heart in a vice.

Of all my ladies and attendants, it was only Berenice who seemed to notice that I hadn't spoken all morning, and that the cup rattled against the saucer in my hand. Or perhaps she was the only one who cared. She lingered with me before the mirror.

I looked at her with worried eyes. I could feel the hysteria bubbling up in my chest now that I had someone I could perhaps confide in, but I knew I mustn't let tears fall and run tracks in my rouge and powder.

"He will be pleased," she said, meeting my gaze evenly.

"How-" My voice faltered. "How do you know?"

"He is a man," she said with a soft smile.

"But you do not know him." She had told me as much. _And neither do I._

"But I know men, _cara mia_ ," she said in her soft accent, her familiar address making my heart ache faintly. "And he will be pleased."

The ride was not long. It took us through the streets of the city that had grown up around Castle Kregów, and which was named for it. The streets were lined with people to see the royal procession. Cheers and cries from perfect strangers to another perfect stranger filled the air. _They sound like they love me_ , I thought. _But they do not know me either._

The curtains were up on the carriage windows, where I sat stiffly, feeling more like an actress in a costume than a woman in a dress. I had been assembled that morning, loaded on with hoops and enormous panniers and jewelry that covered every inch of my bare skin. Every move I made was careful, balanced, terrified lest some carefully arranged piece be knocked askew on this day. This most important of days.

I glimpsed the people rolling by as we made our slow progress along the city streets, which were mercifully smooth and jolt-free. I looked out carefully, cautious of my wig, and of my expression. I tried to make my face look neutral. Could they see how white I was, even beneath my makeup? Could they tell that this wideness of eyes, this clenching of jaw were not how I looked normally, but were manifestations of my anxiety and fear? Ought I to smile? Wave? Even as I thought of it I wasn't sure I could manage it.

I turned away from the window and sat as far back as my corset would allow.

Thankfully, I had the carriage to myself. I could at least be alone with my nerves. Staring unseeing at the cushioned bench opposite, I concentrated only on counting my breaths, trying not to let the quivering sensation in my heart betray itself anywhere on my person.

When I reached one hundred and seven, I felt the carriage turn. I glanced out the window, and then instantly regretted it. We had passed through the city gate and onto the slim bridge that led out to the castle itself, perched on its island of rock in a vast, open valley. The ground on either side fell away and it looked through the window as if I were floating through the air.

I clenched my fingers together and looked down, fixing my eyes on a piece of embroidery on my gloves. It was a small white-and-yellow flower, a daisy. Oh, of course, the gloves had been a gift from my cousin Margarethe. The petals looked neat, but the yellow circle in the middle had begun to wear and several of the threads were broken…

Finally the carriage stopped. There was a commotion from outside, voices calling directions. Then the door was opened. I felt a serene, impassive mask drop over my features. It was time. Time to put myself aside. Time to no longer be just the daughter of a count, to be a frightened sixteen-year-old girl-woman. It was time to be a princess.

My first impression when I stepped carefully out, was one of stillness, and of silence. It was as if my ears were covered – loud in my head were the sounds of my harsh breathing and my heavy heartbeat, but… Nothing else. The light dazzled my eyes after the dimness and I blinked like a person unused to sun. I did not dare take a step until I had my bearings, and I stood there for a long moment, feeling the weight of the silence, and the awkwardness.

Then my vision cleared, and I took one step. Then another.

The ladies and gentlemen of the household were lined up in formal rows, standing stiffly and at attention. The servants, or at least the chief ones, standing like a small army to receive their new mistress. Sunlight gleamed off silver buckes and set white wigs aglare. All were arrayed in the green and gold livery of the house of Kazimir.

Step. Step. Step. The space beyond the door was black; there was no seeing in to tell what awaited me inside. Surely the entire court would turn out for my arrival. But where were they? Just inside the door, watching my clumsy progress up the carpet laid before my feet?

Step. Step. Step. Should I walk faster? No, likely not. I could trip, and then I would run, I knew, all the way back to Austria where I could bury my face in my father's lap and remain safe forever.

But no, I was ascending the steps now, my skirts lifted in dainty fingers that belied their vicelike grip.

A flourish of trumpets sounded from somewhere, and I fought the urge to start like a spooked horse. Even so, my toe caught on the hem of my dress and I stumbled forward. A hand caught my arm and steadied me before too much damage was done, and I grimaced a smile at my assistant without taking in anything of his face. A cold sweat had broken out under my clothes and I was assailed by waves of heat and icy cold.

The trumpets blared as I finally stepped through the doorway, this time without any more stumbles.

Here I had to pause again. I couldn't see a thing in the dimness of the entrance hall. My vision went all purple, and then all green. When I could finally see again, I saw that the grand hall in which I stood was nearly empty, except for a handful of servants. The rich green carpet I had been following ran the length of the entryway, and disappeared under a pair of ornately carved wooden doors.

Two footmen stood at the ready before them. This was it; it had to be. I clenched my jaw, forcibly relaxed my clenching hands, and strode forward with my head erect, seeming to teeter on my neck.

Someone banged a staff and the doors swung open.

It was the largest hall I had ever seen. Larger than any hall in the royal palaces at Innsbruck and Schönbrunn. The ceiling was so high it seemed lost in shadows, and the opposite end, where the green carpet led, so distant I could barely make out the figures there as people.

Light poured in from colossal windows that ranged from floor to ceiling and ran the length of the hall, and illuminated… hundreds of people.

No, thousands.

Every inch of that enormous room was filled with people. Lords and ladies, dukes and duchesses, counts and barons and earls, marquesses and marquises. The entire court, it must be. And every single pair of eyes fixed upon me.

I walked. Even now I don't know how I managed it. I felt my bosom heave and cursed the tight lacing that made my discomposure so painfully obvious with each breath. I kept my eyes fixed ahead, at my goal, at the dais where I knew my future husband sat and watched me approach, though I knew him not. But I couldn't stop my gaze catching on faces as I passed.

Solemn, skeptical, unsmiling faces. And strange fashions. No panniers. No towering powdered wigs. No powder or rouge at all, it seemed. It struck me suddenly that I must look as out-of-place and oddly dressed as a mummer. Everywhere I looked I found raised eyebrows and sullen, appraising glares. No smiles or admiring faces here. Not a single one

And, even more startling among the faces of the crowd… Masks.

I recalled the courtiers wearing masks at the Renunciation Ceremony. I had meant to ask someone – Baron Straz, Berenice, even Spilczeskaya – about them but the trauma of the too-small gown had driven the strange detail from my mind until now.

And not just one or two, but many dozens. Women, and men too, wearing masks in broad daylight, at a solemn occasion such as this. What odd new world had I entered?

Light played over extravagant jewels and caught in the folds of bright, gem-like fabrics. And louder than the rustle of skirts and the shuffling of feet was the susurrus of whispers.

I felt my face grow hot as I realized what was happening. I could almost see out of the corner of my eye, and I could certainly hear, as soon as I passed, each person turn to their neighbor and begin to comment. Until by the time I was halfway through the room, the hum had grown, loud now and apparently completely unashamed. I knew they would talk. They had to. I was important – or I was about to be – and I was new. I just hadn't thought they'd do it right in front of me the moment I walked in.

With an inward twinge that I was already losing the battle, _already_ , failing to command respect and inspire admiration, I fixed my eyes on my goal. Only a hundred feet before me lay the raised platform on which were ranged a half-dozen massive golden chairs of varying sizes and decoration. Several people stood before and around the chairs, not important enough to sit yet enough to be set apart from the sea of aristocracy through which I was currently cutting a slow path. I saw the full complement of diplomats and emissaries, my representatives as well as Blensk's. I had already recognized the tall, mustached figure of Baron Straz among the men on the dais – for they were all men – and the sight of him gave me just the slightest ease. A lady and a princess I might be, but the Baron was the man in charge, at least in this. I was only too happy to be guided by him, to have someone, _anyone,_ tell me what to do.

A couple people were sitting at their ease, and I knew from this fact alone that they were the royal family. My new family, I reminded myself. As nervous as I was about appearing before the entire court, my subjects, it was this introduction that had kept me awake each night for the past week. Before, my father had been all I had. It was just we two against the wide, ambitious world. Now I had left him behind, and had joined my name and my future with these strangers'. It would be they who ultimately determined my happiness, I knew. Or my unhappiness. I tried to make my face smile.

As I approached the steps to the dais, one of the men rose from his gilded chair and detached himself from the general tableau to approach me.

And I found myself standing face to face with a god.

He was resplendent in a coat of forest green velvet trimmed with more gold than fabric, and with two large ravens embroidered over his breast. The lace of his jabot was as fine as baby's breath, or dew upon a spiderweb, as was that of his cuffs, which hung down almost to his knees.

But in this case it was not the dress that made the man. This man would have been an Adonis in beggar's rags.

A mane of dark golden hair flowed almost to his shoulders and framed a face so flawless it might have been carved in ivory. Eyes of a bright, ice blue gazed into mine from under raised eyebrows. They looked as if they were made for laughter, as if this solemn demeanor was merely a façade, and they sparkled with interest and with unmade jest. As if to confirm this impression, one corner of his beautiful mouth twitched upwards. He was tall, towering above everyone by virtue of standing on the dais. He was resplendent, golden, with broad, capable-looking shoulders and long, comely legs tightly encased in golden breeches. And on his head, encircleing his brow, was a slim golden crown.

 _Oh my god,_ I thought.

"My lady, may I present…" Straz's voice floated to me as if from far away, barely registering with me.

The beautiful man – handsome was too weak a word – stepped forward, still half smiling, and extended a hand to me.

"His royal highness-"

 _Could it?_

"Prince Damian of Blensk, of the house of Kazimir."

He bent and kissed my proffered hand, then smiled down at me. "Welcome, dear sister."

It was my only hope, my sole saving grace that my reaction go unnoticed. The hopeful, betraying, _desirous_ spark that had flared in my chest in the few seconds I had thought this man to be my husband had to be extinguished immediately. I stomped on it, ground it into the floor, tried to erase it from ever having happened. Nevertheless, I felt prickles creep up the sides of my neck. Stress. Embarrassment. Shame.

I became aware that the whispering of the crowd had stopped, or at least it had near the dais, and those around us were watching intently, and listening to our meeting. I stammered something polite and meaningless – I can't even remember what, and the man's – Damian's – smile increased as he led me up the few steps to stand on his level.

"We have been awaiting your arrival _most_ eagerly," he said, with what struck me as an odd emphasis.

It was he, and not Baron Straz, who introduced me up the line of dignitaries, referring to me always as "our dear sister, the new princess." I tried to pay attention to memorize names and titles and faces, but the pressure of his gloved hand upon mine turned sounds into murmurs, faces into indistinct blurs of color.

And finally, when all that tediousness was done and the final bland-faced emissary had paid his respects, Prince Damian steered me toward the last figure, seated in one of the gold gilt chairs.

I had been wrong in thinking there were no women here.

I felt time grind to a halt as I turned to look at her. Of all the things that had happened on this wretched journey, this was beyond everything. This was terrifying. This was impossible.

For here, sitting serenely before me, was the woman from my dream.

It _was_ her, truly. Identical in every detail to how she had appeared to me the night before. From her pointed ivory face framed by thick black waves of hair, to her impossibly thin, elegant shoulders. Crimson lips seemed almost to sneer under arched eyebrows and black slanting eyes…

My god, those eyes. Just as in my dream, exact in every lash, and every glint of cold, malicious light. Through some affect she held her face tilted at an angle, and the combination of this with her terrible eyes seemed at the same time to seduce me and to mock me.

"My wife, the Princess Kira Nakahevna," Prince Damian was saying. "I hope you two will be great friends. My darling," he said to her, even his voice seeming to smile, though I could not see his face, too hypnotized by Kira's beauty, and her eyes. "Our dear new sister."

It was only then that I noticed she hadn't risen from her seat. Even now, she looked up at me, too aloof even to be called cold, and seemed to be waiting on me for something. What? Was I to curtsey? The idea of it seemed ludicrous, and yet… the entire room, more than a thousand people, one of the princes themselves, had all stood to receive me. And yet here Princess Kira _sat_ , as if I waited upon her pleasure.

Even as I felt the shame of it wash over me, the boldness of it took my breath away.

I could feel the realization of it spread around the room, like ripples in a pol and we their epicenter. No, not we. She. Kira. I felt rather than saw Baron Straz's distress – the poor baron, such a stickler for the rules. But I couldn't look at him, not even for guidance. She had me, like a serpent that hypnotizes its victims by staring into their eyes. She had me, and I crumbled.

The volume of the hall rose to a dull roar as I bent my right leg before my left, and curtseyed.

A rushing filled my ears, and I stayed that way for many long moments, staring at the tiny jeweled slipper that peeked out from under the hem of her dress, and hating myself.

"Sh-shall we adjourn?" I heard Straz suggest, with an uncharacteristic quaver in his voice.

"Yes, I think we shall," she said, low but clear.

And before I could move, before I could so much as rise from my curtsey, she had risen to her feet and with one gesture of both infinite grace and malice, began to lead the way from the room.

To lead the way.

To lead.

This was wrong. This was so wrong, in such violation to every rule, to the very natural _order_ of things that it couldn't be borne. I couldn't bear it. I wouldn't.

"Your highness!" Exclaimed Straz mercifully, before I could speak myself. I have no idea what I could even have said.

She swept her long train around her as she turned calmly, too calmly, back to face us. "Yes, Baron?" She looked back at him with innocent, inquiring eyebrows.

"Her royal highness, the princess…" He trailed off, gesturing at me.

And it was true. Of course it was. Princesses we both might be but there could be no doubt that as Illiya's wife it was my privilege – my right – to proceed first. What could she possibly say to explain her gross breach of all civilized rules?

She made a show of looking me over as if she were genuinely curious about me.

"Is that who you mean?" She spoke clearly, so that none nearby could mistake her words. I felt hundreds of ears straining, eager not to miss a scrap of my humiliation. "I was quite sure, Baron, that she was merely Count Wallersee's daughter."

"Well, yes, but –"

"Well then surely until she becomes a princess, that is, until she marries my dear brother-in-law and is crowned by him… Is it possible, Baron Straz, that you do not perfectly comprehend the workings of rank and privilege?" Her eyes were wide. "When the lady marries our brother, soon enough I will call her Princess, and then," she continued, nodding with a condescending smile to me. "We will all need to make way for her."  
"Although," she added in an aside to one of her ladies that nevertheless was perfectly audible to all of us. "Perhaps we never will have to call her Princess. Perhaps she too will find him… wanting."

And with that, leaving a wake of tinkling female laughter and good-natured male chuckling, she swept grandly around the dais and from the room, leaving the rest of us to follow.

Stunned, reeling, numb, I took the arm that was offered – Prince Damian's I think, though I do not even really know – and allowed myself to be led out after her, followed by a cacophony of talk and amusement.

"You mustn't mind Kira. She was born a princess, you know, in Astrakhan. Once the marriage is accomplished, all will be as it should." Prince Damian's voice was like silk in my ear, and I glanced up at him. Even then I remember wondering to myself how such an angel could be wedded to such a devil.

And now I know what a fool I was then. Hadn't I seen? The court of Blensk was full of masks.

The entourage of officials followed us through a door behind the dais. The room we entered was smaller but no less opulent. The parts o the walls not draped in tapestry were a deep grey stone, polished and sanded to a smooth finish. The floor was of the same, but covered almost entirely in an elaborate patterned carpet. A monumental wooden table took up one half of the room, and the diplomats had already gravitated toward it, producing papers from nowhere and beginning to spread them about as the arranged themselves for the business of conducting business.

Prince Damian led me to and deposited me in one of the chairs that clustered loosely on the other side of the room near a beautiful but cold fireplace. Princes Kira, of course, was already seated and was chatting animatedly with another woman who knelt on a stool at her feet. When she saw me approach the woman broke off suddenly and looked at me, a startled, guilty look in her face. I thought I had caught the word "wig" in what she had been saying. With an unreadable look, she glanced at Kira, then retreated to stand with a handful of other women ranged behind her chair. Kira's ladies, or household, I assume. Where were mine?

Kira graced me with a smile of maddening calm, then gestured toward a chair. "You may be seated," she said airily.

Hating myself, but not knowing what else to do, I sat.

Prince Damian had joined the group of men conversing over the table, leaving us alone together. Kira seemed content to sit in silence, looking regally bored. In this, at least, I was relieved. I could have sat a thousand years and not been able to think of a single thing to say. And besides, it gave me a chance to gather myself, and to examine my new surroundings. And my new "sister."

I saw she was even thinner than I'd realized at first, though on her it was quite becoming. Somehow she made twiglike arms and knobbed, bony shoulders elegant rather than grotesque. Her thinness seemed to accentuate her graceful lines, the slimness of her neck, the smooth, dramatic line of her jaw. Her delicate, birdlike collarbones dived sharply above shapely breasts and came to end in a soft looking hollow just beneath her chin, where you could see her pulse beat serenely.

I could see all this and more, because she was wearing one of the strangest ensembles I had ever seen. Only now that I could study her closely could I see how truly oddly she was dressed.

What was immediately striking was her lack of sleeves. Nothing, not a strip of fabric covered her slim shoulders, unless you counted her hair, which was entirely unadorned and undressed, left to tumble about her shoulders and down her back. Not a pin nor a comb held it or adorned it. Nor did any false pads or powder, to be sure. No, it was nothing but her natural, god-given gift that floated so elegantly about her angular face, so large and voluminous it made her look even more petite and delicate by comparison.

Straps her dress might not have, but attached to the middle of her upper arms flowed long, elegant pieces of fabric that ran all down the length of her arms and hung almost to the floor. I suppose they must have been sleeves of a sort, though they served no evident purpose and did not do anything to aid her modesty such as, perhaps, actually covering her bosom.

She was gowned in a strange dress of midnight blue, spangled with silver stars. It hugged her form like the bodice of a stomacher, but extended down past her waist to the tops of her hip, showing every curve, as well as the impossible narrowness of her waist. From the bottom of this strange bodice, the folds of her skirts splayed out around her with a magnificent volume of folds and gathers, until at the bottom the circumference was almost as great as mine with my hoops and panniers. I couldn't imagine how she sat, with something stretched so rigidly tight over her hips, but even as I wondered this it occurred to me that she must not be wearing a shift.

Of course, it was just at this moment, when I was pondering which she could be wearing under her strange gown, that Kira herself decided to stop ignoring me and turned to me, catching me staring.

It seemed not to surprise her, as if she'd been expecting it. Or perhaps she'd known I'd been studying her and picked this moment deliberately to turn and catch me out. Either way, she smiled slowly, and I looked away.

But it seemed she was not finished with me.

"What a fascinating tower someone has made from your hair."

It wasn't a compliment, of that I was sure, so I couldn't bring myself to thank her. Instead my lips stretched into what must have been more a grimace than a smile.

"Tell me, who is your hairdresser? Do I know him?"

"Herr Friteller," I said, dragging the name up from what felt like years ago that I had learned it. Though only a few hours had intervened between dressing this morning at Lord Vilny's manor and sitting her across from Princess Kira, I knew the distance I felt was no trick of my mind. This morning had indeed been another life. Everything was different now.

"Yes," she said considering. "I think I may have heard of him. Is he Austrian as well?"

"Yes."

"I suppose that makes sense then," she smirked. Behind her her ladies had drawn nearer and were paying attention to our exchange.

"But the color is so… different. I mean, I've never met anyone so young with grey hair – am I correct that you're sixteen? Is it common in your family to go grey so young?"

I debated how to answer. Just because her own hair was unpowdered did not mean – could not mean – that she had never come across the style. It was the norm in all the courts of Europe, I knew, and I had just seen some courtiers with powdered wigs in the Grand Hall. Even Spilczeskaya and the old bats that had been assigned to my household wore their hair this way.

"It's been powdered. It's not actually grey. It is more yellow-blonde. Very light."

She gave me a look of such innocent puzzlement that I was convinced. She truly must not know what I meant. So, like a perfect fool, I tried to explain.

"The hairdresser has a bowl of powder – white or grey – and then he takes his…" I struggled for the word. I knew how to say brush and sponge and napkin, but what to calle the little powder-puff device used to fling powder over the hair while I covered my face? I didn't know what it's name in German, let alone Russian. "He takes his… device, and casts powder around the hair, like this." Feeling the complete imbecile, I waved one hand in a feeble imitation of the hairdresser's process. "So that it clings to the hairs. And they become grey." My nervousness was also making me clumsy with the language as well – grasping at words and declensions as if I hadn't been speaking Russian with absolute fluency for years.

The look she gave me was even. It said very little, though it meant a great deal. Behind her, I saw a lady hide her face behind a fan.

"And your hair must be so very long," Kira continued. "to make so many curls and towers. Can I ask," she lowered her voice and leaned in slightly. "How long _is_ your hair? When it's down, I mean. Does it go all the way to the floor?"

"No, I, uh… It's about this long." I made a gesture showing it falling a bit past my shoulders. "It is not quite so long as yours is. Much shorter, actually."

"Oh." Again that puzzled look. "Then how…" She made a gesture above her head to suggest a towering hairstyle.

"Pads of false hair, they weave into mine. Extend it, make it larger." My syntax was falling to pieces.

"Oh," she said. "So you're wearing fake hair." She paused, not so much waiting for a response as letting the statement sink in to everyone who was listening, then she continued. "That must take _hours_ though!" I nodded.

It didn't help either that I was having a great deal of difficulty understanding her. Did she have an accent? I listened more closely. No, not an accent. More like an odd inflection. Singsongy, and faster than the classical Russian of my schoolroom. And her grammar was different. Wrong, I would say, except by this point my confidence was so eroded in all areas that if she assured me that the language I'd been mastering for years was really Sanskrit, I probably would have deferred to her. After all, it had only taken her a matter of second to demote me from a royal princess to an honorable counts daughter. How many other ways could she find to turn my world upside down?

But the fact remained, the grammar being used by Kira and her ladies was different than mine. More contractions, slang I didn't recognize, and almost no formal address.

I shifted my focus to listen to the men at the table, drawing up and clarifying the particulars of whatever official business was supposed to be taking place. Though the masculine voices made a rumbling cacophony, I felt my ear eagerly slide into accustomed forms and slow, formal speech rhythms. There, I was right! There was the Russian I knew, the Russian I'd been speaking all along. So why were Kira's ladies speaking differently? Dialect? Kira was from the east, her origins plain in her olive skin and almond-shaped, slanted eyes. Maybe her ladies had all come from Astrakhan with her?

After that mortifying exchange dissecting the fashionable oddity of my hairstyle, Kira said no more to me, but turned and entered into conversation with another one of her ladies, a vicious-looking, cony woman with hair so deep a red it was almost purple. From what I could follow of their inflected, chittering speech, they were very pointedly Not Discussing Me.

I didn't question my reprieve. I took the chance simply to concentrate on breathing.

Baron Straz had regained his striding dealing with business once more. At some point I was led over to the table and asked to sign my name in what turned out to be an infuriatingly shaky scrawl. Historic documents marking the union of two great houses would forever be marred by signature that might belong to a child still learning its letters.

While I leant over the documents, I examined the other names adorning the bottom foot of the paper. There was Straz's, large and heavy-handed. Near the center was Prince Damian's, in a flowing hand as elegant and fair as he was himself. But my eyes kept searching the page, as I grew uncomfortably aware that I was taking far too long about something so simple as signing my name. I was looking for one signature in particular…

There, I spotted it at last. I had missed it because it was not together with the others, but sat alone in the bottom-left corner of the page. An awkward spot, really, and strangely separate from the other names. The handwriting was atrocious; I could barely make it out. A hasty, almost angry-looking hand had inscribed Illiya K in a scrawl that looked more like a wound bleeding black ink upon the creamy white vellum. Did he sign himself K for Kazimir, I wondered? Or for "royal" – _krolewsky_? I glanced at Damian's, where the words _Damian Juzef_ shone clearly. The name was an enigma, and as difficult to find as the man to whom it belonged.

It was true. There were dozens of people in this room and thousands in the one before, but so far the one whom I was most anxious to meet had yet to appear. I tried not to dwell on how odd this seemed. Tried to quell the panicky feeling of foreboding that this was just one more piece in a puzzle whose picture formed something I didn't want to see. I had imagined this day for years, prayed for months that all would go well, that it would prove a threshold to my future happiness. But now that I was finally here, everything was going just contrary to my hopes.

Finally, when the last papers had been signed, the Blenski Foreign Minister spoke up and introduced the Royal Chamberlain, who made a deep bow and announced his intent to show me to my new apartments.

"All has been done according to Pani Spilczeskaya's instructions." At this I groaned inwardly. What could that woman possibly know of my personal tastes? The Chamberlain, a thin man with an equally thin black moustache, continued. "Your effects arrived this morning and are still being arranged, but your boudoir was unpacked first, as I anticipated your royal highness might want to rest before tonight's festivities." He looked extremely satisfied with his ability to predict my needs; but then again I supposed that was precisely his job.

'Tonight's festivities' of course referred to the banquet in honor of my arrival, but the phrase hardly did justice to what I knew was in store: the entire week was to be one enormous party, culminating in the joyous event of my wedding and coronation the Sunday after next. Spilczeskaya had explained everything and Baron Straz had provided me with an itinerary. A tour of the capital city, tea with the women of my extended family – aunts and cousins – a new opera by Blensk's preeminent composer, Jurik Stravan, concerts, parades, feasts, diversions, and parties each night, finishing with the grandest ball that could be conceived on the night itself. Before I had looked forward to such a welcome, such lavish gaiety in my honor. Now I only dreaded it.

Straz thanked the Chamberlain for me and prepared to usher us from the room, but the question that was burning in my mind could wait no longer. I experienced a brief shock of mental strength – this was my life and I would not be ushered about and paraded around just yet. Not without knowing why, although I had presented myself for introduction, my bridegroom had failed to return the courtesy.

"Wait a moment, Baron Straz. Herr Chamberlain." I turned to face the little bald Foreign Minister. I hesitated a moment, unsure how to phrase my question with some greater decorum than simply blurting out 'But where's Prince Illiya?'


	7. Chapter 7: The Prince of Blensk

Straz thanked the Chamberlain for me and prepared to usher us from the room, but the question that was burning in my mind could wait no longer. I experienced a brief shock of mental strength – this was my life and I would not be ushered about and paraded around just yet. Not without knowing why, although I had presented myself for introduction, my bridegroom had failed to return the courtesy.

"Wait a moment, Baron Straz. Herr Chamberlain." I turned to face the little bald Foreign Minister. I hesitated a moment, unsure how to phrase my question with some greater decorum than simply blurting out 'But where's Prince Illiya?'

"Prince Kazimir," I said finally, more timidly than I would have liked. "I should like to meet him."

The Foreign Minister's attentive expression froze on his face. I saw it happen. Then he smiled and blithely sidestepped my request.

"His Royal Highness will join you at the ceremonies, of course." He made a feeble attempt to be lighthearted, even forced a chuckle. "We couldn't have a wedding without the bridegroom, now could we?"

This was too much. Not meet my future husband until the very moment we took our vows? My mind whirled, searching for an explanation. Why all the mystery? If he was ill, or had gone abroad for some reason, why not simply tell me? Unless it was a serious illness? Another woman? Was he at his hunting lodge spending a lusty week bidding farewell to his bachelorhood? Were the Blenki intentionally trying to conceal his whereabouts? To what end?

I glanced at Baron Straz. No, I was sure he didn't know. Surely he knew more than I about the goings-on at court – everyone knew more than I, it seemed – but if something truly underhanded were going on and he was aware of it, he would have informed me. Of this I was certain. His first loyalty was to Austria; of that there was no possible doubt whatever.

No, I would not be put off. I returned the Foreign Minister's smile with what I hoped was one of polite innocence. "I should like to meet him now," I said evenly, and with as little petulance as possible. "I am here. Prince Damian and Princess Kira are here. So where is Prince Illiya?"

The smile stayed fixed and false on the Foreign Minister's smooth face. His eyes were large and light and betrayed a deadly lack of emotion. He would not be bullied by my feeble attempt at regality.

"His Royal Highness is indisposed at the moment, but he greatly regrets that he could not be here to welcome you himself. I will convey to him your eagerness, which I'm sure will please him greatly." He extended an ushering hand and stepped around me with a little bow. "Now if you will please come this way –"

But a voice from above us cut him off and froze us all where we stood.

"Come now, Henryk. Don't be a dissembling ass, though you're so good at it."

As one we all looked up, up for the owner of the voice. I saw, as I had not noticed before, an open gallery framing the second storey of the room. A man stood in the eastern bay. Or the figure of a man, I should say, because his back was to the blinding sun coming in through the window behind him, throwing him into silhouette. I couldn't see his face, but I didn't need to. I felt a jolt like missing a step on the staircase, and the bottom fell out of my stomach. It was him. It had to be! Who else? But I couldn't see him, couldn't make him out. I brought my hand up to shade my eyes, almost desperately finally to look upon him now that he was so close. But he stayed there, hidden, I thought with irony, by the sun.

My imagination ran wild. I saw his shape, a featureless figure ablaze with fierce white light, and I thought, perhaps he is a sun god. Like his brother, but truly radiant…

"The girl would like to see me, Zarovsky. A natural enough request. Anyone would want to see the product before they buy. Naturally she wants to get a glimpse of the future before she signs her life away. Although I'm afraid we're just a few minutes too late in that regard."

The ecstatic hopefulness in me quailed and began to writhe in its death throes. This man was nothing like his brother. His words were sarcastic and had the bite of relished cruelty. What had he said? _Signed her life away…_ And his voice, unmelodious and harsh, seeking to wound as it sounded wounded.

"Of course," the voice continued, and I was shocked. Where before his tone had been grating, now it was as smooth as oil, but still sarcastic for all its unctuousness. So different it could have belonged to another man. "The niceties must be observed. Let our future bride be presented to us. And we to her."

In an instant the figure was gone from above and we were all blinded with sunlight.

I held my breath. Waited. In a few moments he appeared in a doorway directly below. He paused there for a moment, framed with one hand on the doorjamb, half-hidden in shadows. And then he stepped forward.

I don't think I gasped. I hope I did not. He was not his brother, that much was clear. Tall and thin, he strode into the room with the grace of a cat. A majestic tiger circling its cornered victim. A leopard stalking its prey.

But this was not the true shock. The truly remarkable thing was his face, which was entirely covered, except for his eyes and mouth, in a mask. But no comical face from the Venetian carnival, nor one of the gorgeously decorated confections I had observed in the great hall. It was plain black, formed to his face around angular cheekbones and severe brows, smooth and unadorned. The mask was in deadly earnest, and presented a visage as stern and merciless as the black eyes that flashed from behind it.

I felt rather than saw the crowd draw back, but I stayed where I was. I understood by instinct that this confrontation was meant for me alone to face. And I doubt I could have moved if I'd tried. My limbs felt frozen, locked in the terrified stillness of an animal caught in the sights of its predator. As if he could read my thoughts he began to walk around me, circling me, examining. He cut a path wherever he stepped until he and I were alone in the center of the room. An island, cut off from all aid.

I couldn't think what to do. What to say. Where to look. So I said nothing and did nothing, not even curtsey. But if anyone noticed this breach in the etiquette, no one said a word. Not even him. I kept my eyes fixed on a point on the floor about ten feet away, locked on the fringed corner of the Persian rug. All the while I felt his eyes sweeping over me. More cold examination. More detached judgment.

"Well Straz," he said at last, when he'd come all the way round to face me again. "You've done alright, my man. The girl's pretty, even if you did dress her up like an old woman."

"Your highness," I heard Straz say weakly from somewhere behind me.

"Now!" called out the prince, suddenly energetic. "Let's have some privacy, can't we? So I may greet my blushing bride… _properly_." His voice was all menace and insinuation, and I felt panic flutter in my heart. What? Do me harm? Rape me? _Don't go_! I wanted to cry. To the Foreign Minister, to my dear Baron Straz. _Don't leave me alone with him!_

Bu one by one, the ladies and diplomats and servants filed out of the room. Straz turned at the last minute and threw me a helpless glance. My eyes were wide. I don't know what he could have read in them.

Finally the room was empty save for he and I. The atmosphere of buzzing bustling efficiency replaced by a tension taut and palpable as a wire.

Only Prince Damian remained behind, an unobtrusive presence watching from near the door. If Prince Illiya minded this he didn't show it. Evidently whatever he had to do or say to me couldn't be so awful, if his kind and noble brother would be allowed to watch.

"Better," he said shortly. "Now, _my lady_ , let us be perfectly plain with one another – Oh don't' look at the floor like some terrified poppet; look me in the eye."

Terrified poppet as I truly was, my eyes snapped obediently to his, which beheld me in a stare of utter coldness. "Better," he said again. "I know a great deal about you, my little Fraulein." His words were respectful, but everything about his tone conveyed derision. "I know you were sixteen this past April. I know that you were born in Vienna but have spent most of your life on your father's estate outside Salzburg. That your mother lost her life in travail at your birth and that your father lost the use of his legs when he tried to end his lie by throwing himself from a window in his grief."  
I felt my breath catch at this. It was true, of course, but was not commonly known. It had been well covered up, or so my father had thought. He went on.

"You play the flute and the pianoforte but your true passion is for singing. You are advanced in your studies, well-versed in all the usual subjects and in several not so usual ones. You are an accomplished rider of horses – indeed accomplished in almost all the ways young ladies are called upon to be in this enlightened age…" Again this strange dissonance between his words, which were complimentary, and his meaning, which seemed to imply a blasé sort of boredom concerning all the areas in which I took pride. Suddenly his voice took a darker tone.

"I know that counts are a dime a dozen in the Austrian Empire and that the actual dignity commanded by the title is middling at best. But your grandfather, by all accounts a shrewd and tirelessly grasping successor to his beleaguered title – though he died five years before your birth and so you could not have had the pleasure of knowing him personally – that a nose for opportunity mixed with a healthy dose of ruthlessness enabled him to more than treble the size of your ancestral holdings. So the question I am trying to ask is this: What is it that you want, precisely?"

The question and his sudden look of inquiring curiosity caught me so off guard I could do nothing for several moments but stand and gape. Finally I found my voice. "I-I don't understand…" I didn't even realize at first that in my fearful bewilderment I had spoken in German.

"Ah! She speaks!" But his tone turned cold. "Don't you, girl? Understand, that is. Because I believe I do. As we both know, until this summer you stood to inherit an estate of massive size and value. You have no shortage of income. With a dowry like that you could have had your pick of the Austrian nobility, but you declined their offers, dozens of them, didn't you? You could have settled down in the foothills of the Alps with you vast fortune and a comfortable, German-speaking family. But instead, what do you choose? An international arrangement that practically disinherits you – though of course your dowry would still satisfy an emperor. What I want to know is why? What are you doing here, little Fraulein? What do you want from this match with the royal and ancient house of Kazimir?"

I felt like I was being led. If this line of questioning was ingenuous, he didn't make it sound so. Many of his arguments were false or flawed, and all were supremely ungenerous, but to my extreme frustration I couldn't begin to defend myself, not in the heat of that awful first moment. _What are you doing here? What do you want from this match?_

"Happiness." My voice was hollow and small. Little more than a whisper. "Love."

His eyes bored into mine, just a moment, with an unmatched intensity. Anger? Surprise? I couldn't tell, because the next moment he had turned sharply away and faced the window.

His voice was low and even, condemning me with dispassionate conviction. "You are a title-hunter, nothing more. No – do not try to protest; I see it quite clearly. And as for happiness and love… I could almost laugh, if I didn't pity you so greatly. How could you think of happiness, of love –" He spat the word like an obscenity. "When you know nothing of me? Had never received a single correspondence from my hand. Never," his voice dropped dangerously. "Even seen my portrait."

"I thought," I began, but my voice shook so I began again. "I had report that you are a good man. I thought it shouldn't matter."

He gave a short bark of laughter. "Shouldn't matter? We are very upright and idealistic, aren't we?" He turned back to face me, but his eyes were in shadow. But I am afraid," he continued in a low voice. "That they were wrong on both counts. Fo I am neither a good man, nor a handsome one. Come here."

The last thing I wanted was to approach this volatile and frightening man, but his tone was commanding. As though to draw me forward, he unfurled a hand in a gesture that was both graceful and threatening. Entirely in his power, I drew near.

His eyes bored into mine, looking slightly mad for all his demeanor was calm. I was near enough to see the part in his dark hair – like his brother, he wore no wig, but a simple queue – and a muscle clenching in his jaw below the bottom of the mask.

"You haven't asked me why I wear a mask."

 _I am neither a good man, nor a handsome one…_

"I-I saw others," I said. "In the great hall. I thought it a fashion."

"Oh it is indeed a fashion. But I am not one for following fashions." I saw it was true; he was dressed plainly, not at all what one would expect of a prince.

"So come now, see why I wear a mask." He gestured at it, inviting me to remove it. But such a thing was entirely beyond me. To reach out, to touch him – for the thousandth time that day, I was frozen. And a suspicion was growing inside me – I was quite certain I did not want to know why Prince Illiya wore that black mask. I wanted no knowledge, did not want to see what lay beneath it.

He waited, no sound but his breathing and the pounding of my heart in my head. Slowly, with great effort, I shook my head.

This seemed to enrage him. He laughed, a terrible thing with more hysteria than humor. "What? Not frightened, are you? Afraid? Of me? Am I some bogey-man to give nightmares to little girls? Or perhaps you don't want to know? Come, come, don't you know you must taste the dish before it's served? I say, remove my mask! No? Silly, scared child, then I'll have to do it for you." He drew near to me, so that his face was mere inches from mine. "Pay close attention now," he rasped. "You're going to want to remember this. So whatever you do, don't shut your eyes!"

And with that, he ripped the black mask away from his face.

It was terrible. It was hideous. Freakish. Monstrous. He had the face of a demon. Twisted and lined and scarred with deformity made by no human design, but cut upon his face by God's knife. And above the horror of his hollow, ravaged cheeks burned his eyes. I say burned, truly, for in them was such evil hatred, such madness that I felt scorched by it, crucified before him.

I am glad I cannot remember my reaction, for I am sure that now, looking back, I would find myself more ashamed than I already am for the myriad mistakes I made in those early days, results of my foolishness and naïveté. I am blessed in my ignorance. But I am quite sure he remembers, can play it out in his mind like a piece of music committed indelibly to memory. I hope for his sake that he seldom thinks of it.

I remember nothing. Only that a few moments, or perhaps many minutes, later, I returned to find myself kneeling on the floor. Someone was helping me up… Prince Damian, his own face a mask of concern as he gave me his arm. He glanced regretfully at his brother, who faced mercifully away from us and leaned on his hands upon the table. He was silent, but I saw his shoulders rise and fall in great gasping breaths.

"Come now," said Prince Damian, leading me away toward the doorway that, a hundred years ago, the rest of the diplomatic entourage had exited. He paused, took a moment to straighten my rumpled cuff, tucked a stray hair back into my wig. Miraculously, my eyes were dry.

"You should go," he said. His brilliant blue eyes gazed into mine with concern. And pity. I looked into his rose and ivory face, his angels face framed with golden hair. I said nothing, could not speak. But my eyes begged of him. _Why?_

"Go," he said finally, and opened the door himself and guided me through into the room beyond, where the others waited with grim, expectant looks that they did not even bother to disguise with uninterest. Prince Damian closed the door, remining behind with Prince Illiya, and I entered the room alone.

The next minutes, the walk to my apartments, the concerned but pathetic questioning of Baron Straz – all sailed past as if I traveled through a thick fog, moving ghostlike through a world I could not take in. I witnessed their courtesies, but did not see them. Heard their words, but did not listen. When finally I reached my apartments I sailed past appointments and furnishings I did not see, straight into the inner sanctum of my boudoir.

"Leave me," I said in a voice that was neither commanding nor conciliatory.

The door clicked softly, and I was alone at last. I cast my eyes around the room, seeing but not seeing. What was I looking for? A way of escape? A source of solace? I can't know, but my eye caught on a familiar box lying atop the dressing table. It drew me toward it, a deep green leather case with twin ravens embossed in silver, and the Kazimir family crest, "Idz odwazne, I niech nie sie schowaj." _Live bravely and hide not._

My trembling fingers flicked open the silver clasp, and I lifted the lid to look upon my diamonds. There, resting in their nest of black velvet, they glittered just as brightly as they had that morning in April when the world was green and all my hopes seemed to be coming true.

I threaded a finger through the loop of the necklace and drew it from the box. I twisted it around my hand until my fingers tangled with the string of white stones. The gems dripped like frosty icicles down to my wrist. If I unfocused my eyes they winked and glittered even more brightly, like I was clutching a handful of stars.

The room was filled with complete silence, so heavy and pulsating I felt it closing in around me, drawing me down, suffocating me until my breath caught in my throat. A sob. And my eyes were blurred with tears. I fell to my knees, one hand catching at the dressing table while the other clutched the diamonds to my chest. There was a pain, a terrible pain emanating from my heart, and it grew with every pulse until it had crescendoed to a great cry that clamored for release inside of me. It must out, I must make some noise or I would die of the pain, _must_ release it somehow.

My mouth opened, but no sound emerged. That was my release, a long, silent scream as my fingers clawed gashes in the painted wood and the silver fittings cut into the flesh of my hand. A silent scream and soundless sobs as real tears fell finally and freely from my eyes, dropping to mingle with the diamonds in my fist.

There was a silence between the two men. One hunched over a desk breathing hard, his eyes clenched as tightly shut as his fists upon the polished wood. The other hoverd near the doorway with a placid, almost bored look, adjusting the lace of his cuffs as if waiting for something to occur.

Finally Illiya took a single long, deep breath that shook only slightly, and released it in a slow hiss. Then he straightened with a forced calm, deliberately unclenched his fists, tugged on his waistcoat and on the mask covering his face, and turned to face his brother.

"God, I hated that."

Damian did not look up. "You were rather hard on her. I'm not sure she's up to it, frankly. You don't think that was a bit much?"

Illiya's brief laugh was forced. "The world is no rose garden, Kregów least of all. She'll need a thicker skin than that her. Without it, well… she wouldn't have made it anyway."

Damian's only response was a sigh, though whether for the plight of the new princess or out of continued frustration over his wardrobe it was impossible to tell. His brother took no notice. Illiya had noticed a document lying on the table where the Foreign Minister had abandoned it in his hasty retreat. He traced his finger lightly over one of the signatures.

"What's done is done and cannot be undone," he quipped, and then added in a whisper. "God forgive me my cruelty." After a silent moment during which he stared at the swirling script of her autograph, he seemed suddenly to shake himself from his reverie. He pushed the paper away from him and spun on his heel to face Damian.

"I have something else I need to discuss with you, something of great importance. But," he glanced upward at the gallery. "Not here. Not now." He exhaled sharply through his nose, and his hand clenched and unclenched at his side. "I need to think. Can you come to me this evening, before dinner."

"Before I go off and drink my weight in claret, you mean?" Damian chuckled, before realizing that Illiya was too preoccupied to respond to his humor. He cleared his throat and stepped forward. "Of course. I am at your service, brother." He made a brief, gallant bow and swept his hand before him.

But before they had quite left the room, Damian stopped short. "You really did behave abominably to her, Illiya," he said. "With a reception like that… forgive me, but the poor girl could be well on her way to despising you."

"But that's exactly the point," said Illiya quietly, turning over his shoulder but not quite looking at his brother. "It will save time, and a great deal of pain. Making her hate me simply spares her the misfortune of trying to love me."


	8. Chapter 8: The Duty of Princes

A/N: I've completely reworked Chapter 8 after the last posting. Much of it will be similar to what was here before but in recombining I've added a bunch of stuff in, including a massively important and dramatic plot point. Squee! Hope y'all have the patience to read it again, and hope you enjoy! :)

Chapter 8: The Duty of Princes

The Prince of Blensk sat in the sill of a window, staring out at the capitol of his kingdom. The sun was low in the sky, just touching the hills with an orange-gold glow. It was not yet twilight but the lamps had begun to go on in the city, so far below him that their light flickered in the hazy distance between them. People moved in the city, he knew. Walked, talked, closed up shop and headed for taverns or dinner parties, but he was too far to see them, and too lost in his thoughts to notice them if he could. The sun sank lower, its color deepened, and Illiya compulsively vanished and unvarnished a coin between the fingers of his left hand. Legerdemain had been part of his eclectic education, and had turned into a nervous habit.

He was jarred from his thoughts when servants entered to build up the fire and lay a solitary supper at his desk. He had never accustomed himself to dine in public, with the rest of the court he so despised, with its gossip and petty intrigue, and vanity above all, ruling more absolutely than any monarch, incarnated into living representation by his sister-in-law, Princess Kira.

No, he had given up dining with the court almost as soon as he had arrived. There had been a few weeks at the very beginning when he had tried, for appearances sake, to ingratiate himself amongst his courtiers, but the vapidity of the conversation, and the duplicity he saw all around him… It had been insupportable. Besides, Illiya Kazimir had never been a success at appearances. Two years now he had been eating alone, and he didn't intend to start making exceptions now, even for the presence of that girl to whom he found himself betrothed.

He heard a flapping of wings, and turned to see the raven had flown from its perch to the window. Probably preparing to leave and go hunt its own supper, Illiya supposed. Though he would gladly have fed it, it had never seemed interested in the food Illiya had offered it when it first began flying up to the prince's window. It had begun visiting him the very day he had arrived, made grand progress through the streets of Kregów, sitting tall upon a midnight charger, his golden brother – that was the very day they had first met – riding by his side, slightly behind, until they had come to the gates of the castle and, granted entry, established their court. _His_ court, Illiya reminded himself.

What would make a great black raven call upon his tower window with such regularity, if not food? The servants whispered about it, he knew, called it his familiar, and the court laughed it off as another of Prince Illiya's famous behavioral oddities. Honestly, what kind of prince kept a pet bird? Even Damian wrinkled his good-looking brow whenever it appeared and referred to it as "that weird bird of yours."

But Illiya hardly listened or cared, any more than he usually did. What was one more piece of gossip, one more instance of Prince Illiya's strangeness. Besides, he thought wryly, did it not merely add to his persona? The dark, brooding prince with a touch of madness, who perversely locked himself away from the world with his monster's face and his macabre winged companion. Yes, he supposed. That was about right.

But that wasn't really why he enjoyed having the bird round. To tell the truth, he admired its coat of smooth, glossy black and its dispassionate but ruthless eye. Ravens were uncommonly intelligent, he knew, could be trained to perform all manner of tasks both useful and useless. He'd read that imbeciles styling themselves men of science – really just tinkerers in his opinion, with too much money and time on their hands – were teaching them to perform tricks for the monarchs of Europe. Well that was all well and good, but the intelligence of ravens was hardly a discovery of the enlightened intellectuals of London and Paris.

Blenski peasants had all sorts of legends about the raven. It was a common motif in fairytales and children's rhymes, in which the raven, who could always speak, typically played the part of clever mischief. That, or the wise king of the birds. And of course the raven was the Kazimir family crest. That was the true reason Illiya like the bird. What were the chances, of all the birds in the coutry and all the windows in the castle, that this magnificent specimen would choose to visit him? It felt like a sign, a confirmation of his title, a reminder of his place in his family, and in his realm. And who knew if the same bird might not have visited his predecessors. Did the Kazimir family have some mystical agreement with these birds, potent symbols of their familial power? Perhaps it was merely inexplicable tradition. Some might view the raven as a signal of woe, but Illiya chose to see it as a benediction. Its visitation was a sign to him that he was proceeding in the proper course, ruling well, doing justice to his ancient lineage. He knew some might dismiss this as superstitious silliness but Illiya could not feel the same. Titles, crests, symbols – these were not merely the showy trappings of power. They represented a bastion of cohesion and unity in a world always tending toward chaos. Your name told you whose side you were on, your motto what you stood for, and your crest which virtues you ought to emulate and aspire to. The raven: keen, ruthless, cunning, intelligent. Machiavelli himself could not have asked for a more fitting mascot.

The bird had flown from its perch to the stone windowsill. It turned its head and blinked at Illiya with one black eye, then was gone in a sudden rustle of flapping feathers. Out of the corner of his eye, Illiya saw one of the servants cross himself, and in annoyance he turned around firmly to watch the bird sail out into the fading light over the mountains, until it shrank to a speck and, finally, disappeared in the blue vista.

The man's gesture annoyed him, as did any comment on or even observation of his personal habits. As did now the clank and light clatter of the meal being laid.

He felt the impatience on the tip of his tongue. _Are you quite finished?_ But he swallowed it, though not without difficulty. His mind swirled and in order to sort through it all he needed to pace, to think, but that was something he'd never been able to do with another person in his room. Except his brother, he supposed. Damian had a way of relaxing him, putting him at his ease. He was, Illiya reflected, the only person who had ever made him feel thus.

Despite the business with the raven, Illiya was not a superstitious man. Nevertheless he wondered how much of his closeness with Damian stemmed from their birth, that quasi-mystical accident that created two beings from a single seed. And two such different beings he was sure there had never been. Like night and day, devil and angel. And yet…

Illiya cast his mind back to the day they had first met. A fateful day in so many ways: the day the raven had appeared, the first day of his reign. Thirty-two years the two brothers had lived in exile, kept away from the court for their own safety and away from each other in the interest of security. Prince Jurik the Fifth had been the last broken-down, half mad descendant of Eugevny the Great, a line of succession whose end had been as pathetic as its beginning at the Battle of Varna had been glorious. The civil wars had been raging for over a century, and bloody tug-of-war between the descendants of Eugevny the Great's younger brother and those of his eldest daughter. Iliya's line, the Kazimiri, descended from Eugevny's brother, while Jurik was the last descendant of the Prihnn line of Eugevny's son-in-law. When Illiya's father had died prematurely, the Prihnny had staged an opportunistic coup and the Princess, heavily pregnant with Illiya and Damian, had fled. As a prince, Jurik had shown promise at first. Youngish and handsome with all the hopeful promise of the untried. But looks had been deceiving, and the approving comments about the new prince's piety and energetic enthusiasm turned to whispers about his unstable personality and religious fanaticism. When it became clear that his marriage to an Italian Princess would fail to produce a single heir of either gender, there was nothing left for the disinherited Kazimir faction but to watch and wait. The country was heartsick of bloodshed and tyrants, and when Prince Jurik finally died, broken and mad, plans were laid for Illiya to return to the capital he had never seen and, along with the brother he had never met, peacefully assume the reins of power.

Jurik had at least had the good grace to die in March, so that the commencement of Illiya's reign could benefit from the natural optimism of springtime. It was chilly in the mountains still, particularly in the morning, but the days had given way to clear blue skies and sunshine that woke the sleeping green things of the earth. Illiya had rendezvoused with the Chief Minister of Jurik's cabinet at the Romanian border, and within three weeks the march had brought them to the gates of the capital city, Kregów. One of the lords of court had shown his good grace to the new regime by lending his manor house as temporary headquarters for the new monarch, and this was where Illiya had been ensconced for three days, less than half a days' ride from the city, awaiting the arrival of his twin brother.

He and his new council had set up business in the back gallery of the house, the casement windows thrown open to let in the warm afternoon breezes, which ruffled the pages scattered across the table but obligingly did not dislodge them. They had broken for luncheon and Illiya, preferring a glass of tea and solitude to the forced conversation and sycophantry of socializing with his council, had remained behind. As he bent over a list of proposed pardons – necessities for bridging together the old and new regimes – Illiya realized he was more nervous than he wished to admit. He had wanted solitude to look over the list, several members of which had only just absented themselves for champagne and cold chicken in the adjoining room. If anyone thought it awkward for council members to discuss pardoning themselves as casually as if debating which horse to back in a race, no one acknowledged it.

But for Illiya, to whom it was all still new, the list of names filled him with an anxiety he had never before experienced, and Illiya Kazimir had experienced a great deal. To be sure, he had lived his life with the knowledge that this day would come, that his path ultimately led to the throne. Even exiled from court, his education and upbringing had all aimed to prepare him for precisely these obligations. But here, now, when he held lives in his hand as easily and literally as he now held a piece of paper… It was one of the few times in his life thus far that Illiya had known fear. Not the adrenaline-fueled terror of nightmares, or the simple, straightforward fright of the chase or the fight or the unexpected attack – and he had known his share of all these; no number of silver spoons in his mouth could compensate for the reality of possessing a face like Illiya's. Trouble and danger had a way of seeking him out, and vice versa.

No, this fear was more complicated, and more insidious. It was more like the fear of failure. His entire life he had only needed to look after himself. But now he found himself responsible for the welfare of an entire people.

Illiya's thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a door opening followed by footsteps. Assuming it to be a footman, Illiya did not turn around, but sighed and bent farther over the piece of paper, determined to maintain his thread of thought surrounding the pardons. It was difficult, however, as the intruder was making far more noise than was appropriate for a servant.

"Leave it, whatever it is, and go," he growled. "And close the door behind you."

From behind him came a bark of laughter. "Not bloody likely, my friend. I believe I'm expected. And besides," he said, drawing up a chair by the sound of it. "I was told there'd be luncheon."

Not a servant then. Illiya turned around to see a handsome man with a flop of golden hair reclining with impossible ease, having rocked backward a gilded chair onto its back legs, and propped his own up on a table. Illiya raised an eyebrow. Despite his apparently casual attitude to the finery of the furniture, the man was hardly dressed like an aristocrat. His coat was of a military cut, but the green wool, although officer-grade, was stained and sun-faded, and his buff-colored trousers were likewise covered in the dust and grime of travel and long wear. Illiya glanced down to where a substantial pair of authoritative boots that would have been black, had they not been so encrusted with dried mud, rested with casual indifference on the polished surface of an inlaid table.

Illiya raised an eyebrow. "I believe that's ivory."

The golden-haired man raised his head and glanced down toward his feet. "So it is. All the same, I hardly think the poor bugger will mind – walrus or elephant or whoever he was."

"No. But I imagine Lord Sergevny might."

The stranger smirked. "Well, from what I understand, Lord Sergevny is lucky to still have his head, let alone a house full of ivory card tables."

Illiya glanced down at the list still clutched in his hand. There was the name, _Nikolai Sergevny, Baron Rzhadov_.

"You have a pen there," said the stranger, as if he could read Illiya's thoughts. "All it would take is a black mark and a signature."

"Are you such a student of Machiavelli, then?" said Illiya, finding his impatience with the man's impertinence extinguished by his sheer audacity.

"Far from it." The man raised innocent eyebrows in a charming, guileless face. "I was merely pointing out the reality of the situation. That the option is there, but the choice… Ah well, it's the choice that is everything, isn't it?" He paused, and let the rhetorical hang in the air for a moment. It was then, when the smile left his eyes to be replaced by something deeper, Illiya saw it. An expression of depth and gravity he had seen before only in a mirror, a look that he would come to recognize as the only physical resemblance between him and his brother.

Now he understood the incongruity of the man's attitude with his rugged appearance. Damian had, in the grand tradition of younger brothers and second sons, been trained for the military. He'd spent his entire adult life in service in the Greek army, Greece being the traditional ally of Blensk. And from what Illiya had heard, Damian had quite a knack for warfare; at thirty he'd become the youngest Major General in that kingdom's history. Just now Illiya was poised, as had always been the plan, to place him at the head of Blensk's own military, a position of power second only to Illiya's own. But even royal money is not inexhaustible, and not every exiled family is as fortunate as, for example, the Stuarts, whose last once-handsome heir was currently drinking himself into oblivion in a palace in Rome. Damian, like Illiya, had largely had to find his own way, and even a successful military career was not necessarily glamorous. In fact, quite the opposite.

Prince Damian met Illiya's eyes with intensity for a long moment, before continuing casually, "Besides, I wouldn't say I was much of a student at all. Positively abominable at Latin, you know." He grinned, showing off a set of strong, perfectly straight white teeth. "So brother, what's for lunch?"

When the last of the servants had gone and the door to Illiya's chamber shut with a deferential click, Illiya allowed himself a sigh that was almost a groan. He flung off his mask and, throwing himself into a chair, rubbed his face with both hands. As much as he preferred to wear it, taking it off always brought such a sensation of freedom, as if he didn't realize how it pressed down upon him until he felt the refreshing rush of air against his naked face. Taking the mask off was something Illiya did only when absolutely alone. He rubbed the heels of his palms into his closed eyes and exhaled slowly. He reached for the glass of wine that stood at his right hand and sipped it. And finally, he allowed himself to raise his eyes to the painting that hung on the wall opposite.

He had looked it a thousand times before, with close scrutiny, his eyes searching to create the image of a live being from the cold, cartoonish brush-strokes. He had thought the painting was skillful enough. Certainly it looked like any other portrait hung about the walls of this gloomy castle. The fashions were newer, the subject a stranger, and the colors were brighter, whether in contrast to the age-darkened hues of older paintings, or a result of the artist's preference for pastels. But all in all, he had thought it a good painting by an acknowledged master.

Now however, as he looked with new eyes, he was appalled at the crudité of the piece. It was more a cartoon than a likeness, lacking any substance, any weight, any presence. The skin that he'd thought looked fair and flushed looked flat and grey, the eyes dead and dull. The form that had looked pillow-soft and yielding was now no more than the flat, indifferent coolness of paint-covered canvas. What had changed? What was the difference? It was the same portrait that had always hung there. No, _he_ had changed. He had seen the model in the flesh, ad now the comparison was absurd. How could that painter think himself skilled, when he had rendered her with such obvious clumsiness? How charge a commission, when his childish picture had missed the quick beat of her pulse, the hesitant draw of her eyebrows, the part of her pink mouth, and worst crime of all, had replaced the eager and anxious expression of her eyes with a vacant and vacuous smile. What idiot would paint a rose using only pastels, capturing its general prettiness but none of its depth. The pleasantness but not the complexity. How could anyone admire this dull copy when they knew the original? How could he, when he had received her energy, as frightened as she was, and had felt the breath of life in her?

Illiya had no patience for bad art.

He regretted that she'd had to see what she had. He had wavered for a long time about when and how to reveal his face to the girl, and had finally decided that it needed to be now, today, that it would provide the capstone to his grotesque and reprehensible performance. Regret… No one should have to see what she had. He had given her one last chance to run, to refuse, as Kira had done years before. The papers were signed, the assets had changed hands, but it could all have been dissolved if she'd collapsed into a hysterical mess and insisted on being dragged to the altar by force.

Illiya knew he was the son that should never have been. They were twins, born in exile to a dying mother, the last hope of a royal lineage close to extinction. It was this circumstance that galled him – galled Damian too, although Illiya could not know how. Twins were an extravagant accident, a waste of good sons. It only took one to rule. If it had been only Damian, or if Illiya had not come first. The coincidence of a few seconds was all that made Illiya what he was, and Damian what he was. What a flimsy thread upon which to build a succession.

It was not the life Illiya would have chosen. He had known that long before he had returned to Blensk at thirty-two to claim the vacant crown. He had seen much of the world in his years of exile, more than enough to know that the labor of government and the spotlight of a glamorous court were not his natural inclinations. In the two years since he had come to court, he had stopped himself fantasizing what his life might be if only Damian had been first to slip from their mother's womb. Or even, if he had never been at all. Oh he had entertained such thoughts his entire life. It was merely that now, here, in the midst of all the business, the pang of such wistfulness felt not only the more bitter, it also felt somewhat treasonous. If it was treason to imagine the death of the Prince, or to hope for an alternative one, then surely there could be no exception, even if – or perhaps especially if – that prince was he himself.

Not that he was such a stickler for the rules; the letter of the law hardly reigned supreme in him. Indeed, as time went on he increasingly understood the tenet that anyone who craved a crown likely little deserved it. Illiya had merely resigned himself to the way things had to be. Few people in this world were lucky enough to choose their paths, if indeed anyone was. And if being Prince of Blensk was not the life he would have chosen for himself, it was nevertheless the hand he had been dealt, heir not only to the title and the throne, but to the care of his people and the hopes of his family. He was born to an obligation, and he had long ago resigned himself to discharge it to the best of his ability. What an irony, if he were destined to do some good in this world.

But he had not always been a fatalist. It had taken decades of railing and cursing and beating his malformed head against the wall of the world to break him. Too many attempts to squeeze drops of acceptance and kindness from its inhabitants before one final blow made him understand that he was trying for blood from a stone, that no matter how he tried, the answer was always the same in the end. The world and its people were not for him, and the sooner he stopped trying the less would be the pain.

Although there had been plenty of that already.

Illiya was tired of trying and failing. That was why he had already decided not to try with this one, this pale blonde girl with her clever blue eyes and pillowy white skin. He had tried once before, with another girl of even greater beauty, and it might have broken him were it not for the defenses he had learned to erect around his innermost places. Defenses that consisted in no small part of scar tissue.

So Damian had said he had been unkind. "Abominable" was the word he'd used. Well, Illiya was long used to being an abomination. He had been born one.

But, Illiya silently defended himself, he had said nothing untrue. For all her wide eyes and wounded mein, he told himself that he had still pegged her well. A wealthy Austrian grasper who had jumped at the chance for a title without asking questions. Never mind that it was precisely what they had needed, what they had been looking for. After that business with Kira two years ago, it had been a challenge to find the right one. He and Damian had discussed it when it became clear that Kira was not going to produce an heir anytime soon. They'd needed someone close enough to be politically relevant, but isolated and with weak enough family connections to prevent any potential retaliation once the truth about Blensk was revealed. No, the truth about him. He mustn't delude himself. This entire affair boiled down to tricking some poor hopeful girl into marrying a monster.

And Charlotte von der Leyen, the secluded, bookish daughter of the crippled Count of Waldersee was perfect. But she had surprised him. Moved him, even. Even if she was a title-hungry social climber, as soulless and greedy as anyone else at court, it was still true that she was only sixteen, far from home, and thrust into a situation beyond any she could have prepared for, among as ruthless a den of wolves (that was, the court) as had ever existed. The girl was out of her depth, whatever her intentions. And, at the end of the day, she had just signed her life away in marriage to a monster. Illiya felt himself softening, then regretting. She deserved pity, if anything, and not humiliation in front of the entire Chamber Council.

Yes, all his accusations had been accurate. He only hoped they had been just. One thing only gave him pause, and that had been her answer to his question.

 _What do you want from this match?_

 _Happiness._ The smallest voice, like the mewl of a tiny thing in pain.

 _Love._

Without thinking he sprang up and, striding over, lifted the portrait from where it hung and put it on the floor, turning its face to the wall.

He did not want to see her. Not even this boorish caricature that, despite its shortcomings, still had the power to call her image, her real image, to his mind. He did not want to see the silken softness of her neck and bosom. Did not want to see the delicacy of that wrist, or the slenderness of those petite fingers. Did not want to see, or imagine he could feel the clarity of her skin, the brightness of her cheek. Did not want the warmth of her intelligent, expressive eyes to behold him. Did not want to think about that slight wisp of blonde hair at the base of her neck, or imagine its silken softness between his thumb and forefinger, or even imagine it freed from its pins and pads and powder to fall freely around her shoulders and entwine around his fist. He did not want to imagine. Did not want to see. Did not want to feel.

He was brought to himself by a crash of tinkling glass and a slight pain in his hand. The majority of the crystal goblet lay shattered on the floor, except for some largish shards of it which stayed stuck in the flesh of his palm.

With fascinated, almost calm detachment he plucked the shards of lass from where they stood embedded in his skin, then let them fall to the ground to rejoin the others, and watched almost curiously as the blood from his hand fell to mix with and darken the pool of red wine already staining the floor.

Perhaps if circumstances were different. If he had a handsome face – no, not even a handsome face, just a normal one like any other man's – there might be a chance. If it were different he might be able to take pleasure in such imaginings, in entertaining the hope that they might someday be real. The wedding was in less than two weeks. He could do it, anything he wanted. It would be his right. And somehow the thought of it made him sick.

That was why he needed to talk to Damian.

If only it were the black blight on his soul, that might be got over. He did not believe he was rotten to the very core; there might be some good part of him redeemable yet, if the right person should come along. A very special person, who with optimism and charity and the stainless spirit of youth might effect his transformation into something more resembling a human man…

But circumstances were not different. He was marked on his exterior, as well as his interior, and while some saintly woman might look past one, there could be no getting past both.

With indifference he plucked a handkerchief from his breast pocket and wrapped it around his cut hand. Then he let his darker thoughts overwhelm him, and he sat staring into the fire until it had burned down into glowing coals.

Damian had helped himself to a glass of rhenish and poured a second one for Illiya, who accepted it. Illiya had thrown himself into a chair with the relaxed abandon he always allowed himself in his brother's presence, and Damian had lowered himself rather more calmly into a seat opposite.

They sat in silence for a while, each lost in their own thoughts, with not a sound between them but the raven worrying something on the fastening of its perch.

Finally Damian spoke. "She's quite pretty, actually. You never know with these things. You're going to be a lucky man, brother."

"She would be," growled Illiya, staring unseeingly ahead while he drank off half his glass of wine at once. "Except for all that powder and that ridiculous hairstyle they call a fashion. Tell me, how is it stylish to turn a child's hair grey?"

"I wonder what is beneath it all. With that much, she could be dark or fair with equal likelihood. I wouldn't know where to put my money." Damian chuckled lightly, but Illiya did not join him.

"Fair," he said quietly.

"Really? How could you possible tell?"

"Small bits near her temples that they hadn't covered up. The hair there was… very fine. Also her eyebrows…" He trailed off and Damian very deliberately said nothing, but took a sip of wine.

"She really is little more than a child," said Damian after a moment. "I forgot how young sixteen truly is. Kira isn't much older, of course. She'll be twenty come March. But she's…" Damian considered his drink.

Illiya finished the thought for him. "One could almost imagine that Princess Nakahevna was never a child at all. At sixteen, or any other age."

"Yes exactly," grinned Damian. "But as I said, she's a lovely young thing, and you'll be a lucky man to have her." He raised his half-full glass to Illiya, who met his eyes with an odd intensity.

"So you fancy her then," he said. "Find her… attractive?"

"I- Well…" Damian spluttered, unsure of an appropriate response, but Illiya shook his head.

"Nevermind. Leave it be." Illiya studied his glass. "Hardly more than a child…" he repeated to himself.

Damian leaned forward as well. "Brother," he said with meaning. "What was it that you wanted to discuss with me?"

Illya's brow furrowed, and he set his mouth as if he'd just come to a decision. Setting his glass down on the sidetable, he leaned forward in his chair toward Damian.

"You are such a great help to me, Damian. Your support, your… friendship makes all this –" He gestured, and it seemed to include the castle, the court, even the realm. "Bearable. But I'm afraid I have something more to ask of you."

"Anything," said Damian.

"No," Illiya cut him off. "You must hear what it is before you agree to it. It's no small thing and I do not ask it lightly."

"Make me hear you if you must. I will, but I know my answer. Ask anything honorable of me, brother, and it is done. You know it is." Damian's bright blue eyes gazed solemnly into his brother's black ones.

Illiya sighed. "Anything honorable," he repeated. "Well, let us see." He took up his glass and leaned back in his chair.

"You know why I have to take a wife. Pressure from the Chamber Council, from the very people themselves, so they tell me. I did not want to. I still don't. I was more than content to hold power until you should have a son, a nephew I could name my heir. But it has been almost five years and Kira has not… Well. The kingdom must have an heir, and it must be one of ours, or the Prihnny branch will take everything after your death-" He broke off, realizing that he was rambling. Damian knew all this as well as he; he was skirting the real issue. He began again.

"I've had my whole life to accustom myself to the notion that I will never marry. Never be the object of a woman's love. Never have children or a family of my own. I have been… content with that. It is as it must be. No woman should be joined forever to this…" He gestured at his mask. Then he looked significantly at Damian. "And she doesn't have to be."

"The girl is here - the wedding will go on. But she's met you, met me. Seen you, and seen me. And after today she' hasn't a reason in the world not to despise me, on top of everything else. Beautiful girls… they dream of loving the prince, not the frog. Not the best."

Damian looked up at his brother sharply, doubt and a suspicion growing in his eyes. "I hear your words but I don't grasp your meaning. Best be plain, Illiya, I never was as quick as you. What do you mean, 'she doesn't have to be…?'"

Illiya's eyes burned into his. "You take her instead of me. For her sake. Be both a brother… and a husband to her."

"My God-"

"I will wed her in name only. And the child-"

"Will be Kasimir."

"Precisely. Just as it must be. She is pretty, as you've said yourself. And sweet-tempered, and intelligent… It will not be a hardship for you to lie with her."

Damian wore a dazed look, and glanced from his brother, to the floor, and back again. "'Not be a hardship?' No, not for me, but what about for her? She's come to wed you, Illiya, not me. I am nothing to her but some stranger, a second son about whom she knows nothing – And to impose myself upon her bed? Don't you think the poor creature has been through enough without enduring that?"

"You know as well as I that you would not be imposing yourself. Look at us." Illiya smiled a joyless smile. "She knows neither of us, and there is no question of whom she would rather 'endure.' Anyone woman would thank God to be with you instead of me. And I… It is _I_ who have no desire to impose myself. My God, it would practically be rape. No, even if she endured it, did her duty –" He broke off, his voice failing him.

"No," he continued finally. "I will not. I would rather die first. You speak of the honorable way. _This_ is the honorable way. Don't you see? It _must_ be you. Please."

Damian was silent many moments, appearing to gravely consider the desperate arrangement while mastering his own emotions.

For Illiya, it was mastery itself not to bend his knee, humble himself before his brother, entreat him to say yes. He kept his hands clenched over his knees and fixed his eyes upon the fire while Damian considered. He _must_ say yes. Must see that there was no other way. Illiya would not do it. Could not and live with himself. If Kira, for all her magnificent, proud beauty, truly was barren, then all rested on this young girl, this fair new princess, and upon Damian to get her with child. For illiya never would.

At last Damian spoke. "Yes. I think I do see. It is an awful thing you ask, but I see that there's sense in it. If you're sure this is what you want. If you're absolutely determined?"

"I am," said Illiya.

Damian sighed. "You are my brother and my prince. How could I refuse anything you ask?" Illiya rose to his feet and Damian followed. "You have my loyalty and my trust. As you have my love." He offered his hand, and Illiya shook it solemnly, knowing that his brother spoke the truth. The thought was almost enough to bring a solemn smile to his face, if his mind were not so heavy with what they had just agreed.

Damian turned to go, then paused near the door. "Christ, what will I tell Kira?"

"Must you tell her?" called Illiya from beside the fire.

"She will wonder where I am nights, don't you think?"

"Yes, I suppose you're right," conceded Illiya, though he preferred not to think of that if he could help it.

He considered for a moment, then said, "You may tell her, I suppose, if you think it necessary to take her into your confidence. I'll leave the particulars to you – you know better than I what to say to her. But I hardly need to tell you that this must be kept in strictest confidence. No one must know. _No one."_

"She is on our side, you know. However much you dislike each other, she is one of us. Her first allegiance is to you."

"To you, you mean," countered Illiya ruefully.

Damian only smiled expansively. "Which is one and the same. I take my leave of you, brother. Will I see you downstairs tonight?"

"You most certainly will not," growled Illiya, and Damian only chuckled and waved behind him as he showed himself out.

It was growing dark by the time Damian left his brother's chambers. Only a weak light filtered through the windows he passed at every rotation of the long spiral staircase, and the steps themselves were becoming difficult to see. He had long accustomed himself to Illiya's eccentric choice of residence. The highest room in the tallest tower – not exactly what royal privilege and custom required. Quite the opposite, in fact. Too many stairs. Any normal prince would have chosen apartments on the second floor, as Damian himself had. These were roomy and comfortable, as well as convenient, having been more recently renovated in line with modern ideas about space and aristocratic comfort. Illiya's remote eyrie had stayed more or less unchanged since the building of the castle in the fourteenth century, as far as Damian could tell. Cole stone walls and floors adorned only by carpets and hanging tapestries. Perpetually gloomy because the windows were little more than glorified arrow slits and allowed little light. A climb to make your heart race and a view so precipitous once up there as to make it stop.

Ah well, the climb kept him fit and his legs well-muscled. All the same, Damian preferred the climb down to the climb up.

Damian stumbled, nearly lost his footing, cursed, then righted himself with a hand against the stone wall. He must be more careful. He was excited, taking the steps quickly in his eagerness to tell what had just transpired.

He heard a shuffling of someone coming up the stairs, and the slow growth of a golden light showed it to be the light-boy. Damian continued to descend, then snarled at the boy when he leapt aside to let the prince pass, making what obeisance was possible in the tight spiral.

"Get these torches lit earlier, you runt. I damn near killed myself." He raised a threatening hand to the youth, who instantly whimpered out a pathetic apology. Damian cuffed him, not that hard really. Just enough to set the boy's ears ringing. He continued down the stairs almost smiling to himself and feeling much better.

He whistled the rest of the way, musing on his great success, trying to think of the best way to tell her. Right away? Or make her wait for it? It would make her so happy, and he loved her best when she was happy. Triumph always brought out the wildness in her, the sheer abandon of celebration made her positively… acrobatic. Perhaps he should make her beg for it, he thought. That would be fun.

Finally he had come all the way down, found the door he wanted, entered without knocking.

Entering, he saw a woman alone. All he got were flashes as lust overcame his brain. Her standing, sipping tea while reading a letter in her other hand. Her looking up, her eyes wide and startled. The crash of the china as he bowled into her with long strides. Grabbing her by her silk-clad waist and carrying her as if she weighed nothing. Her cry, and her hands seeking purchase on his shoulders, around his neck. Her dark hair tumbling in his face. Her pleading in his ear. The plump roundness of her butt cheeks as he held them, on fitting perfectly in each large hand. The hot, pulsating tightness of her, resisting him while at the same time inviting him deeper.

A quick shuddering release on his part, and one long final scream on hers, and it was done.

He collapsed back on an obliging settee and Kira curled on top of him, panting slightly but practically purring with satisfaction. Her slanting eyes gazed up at him from where her chin rested on his chest, and he could not keep the grin from his breathless face.

"So I guess things went well?"

"Exactly as you said. And he even thinks it's his own idea. Do you think the girl will prove… difficult?"

"God no," said Kira, rolling off of him. She pulled a cord on her way to the dressing table and by the time she had sat down and arranged her skirts a servant had appeared from nowhere and begun repairing the damage done to her sex-mussed hair. "She's perfect, even better than I'd hoped. Such a nervous disaster, and a complete fashion tragedy. I even think she might be kind of stupid. Didn't you get that impression?"

"Difficult to say. I'd rather not underestimate her until we know her better." _Until I've known her better_ , he thought, pleased at his own mental pun.

Kira shrugged, then turned back to the mirror. "Uggh, and I was all dressed for dinner. My bangs were perfect." She directed a small pouting frown at her reflection. Then she seemed to reconsider. "No," she said sharply to the maid, and waved her away from where she was about to cover up a love bite on Kira's shoulder. "Let it show." Her reflection gazed at Damian with cat's eyes. "I want them all to see."


End file.
